Saturday 1 December 2012

The 411 On The Kindle Fire

By Alan Sutton


Chances are high, if you're here, you're thinking about purchasing the Kindle Fire. You are probably a Kindle owner planning to upgrade, or perhaps you are looking into the Fire as an e-reader and tablet. In terms of pricing, it will not get better than the Kindle Fire. Amazon introduced their custom Android tablet in Nov of 2011 with a price tag under $200. It seemed to be a thought out move just before Christmas. It swiftly became one of Amazon's top sellers.

The earliest Kindle was introduced in 2007. The system was around the size of a medium paperback book created specifically for reading. When Amazon revealed the third generation of Kindle, which basically mirrored the 1st with the same E-Ink technology offered in black and white only, Barnes and Noble introduced the Nook Color. Owners began customizing their Android powered Nooks not only to read books, but to play 3D games and run programs in color. The Nook Color revolutionized the 7-inch tablet market.

It absolutely was a no-brainer for Amazon to answer Barnes and Noble with the Kindle Fire. The Kindle Fire uses a custom version of Google's Android Gingerbread os. The highly well-designed and user-friendly interface, known as the Carousel, makes it a straight forward unit for everyone. The Kindle Fire is the 1st Kindle which has a completely functional web browser. It isn't just any old browser either. It's name is Silk and offers users a very computer-like Internet experience.

Since Amazon has always been an internet seller of books and music, they have used the Kindle Fire to monopolize entertainment. Along with the Fire, they rolled out a zero cost month of membership for their Prime program allowing users a chance to access more than 20,000 videos and TV shows. Users can find virtually every kind of content for the Kindle Fire including Android apps. There's a large selection of this content that's available completely free, consequently it fits any budget.

The Amazon Kindle Fire retrieves content in a matter of seconds by using a Wi-Fi connection. It offers plenty of storage capacity, however, any constraint is quelled by means of the free cloud storage offered through Amazon. All the content delivered electronically to your Kindle is stored online with your Amazon account. The focus on reading hasn't faded. Kindle books are now in full color, and you do not need an external light to read the display.

You may be wondering "what's wrong with the Kindle Fire?" Why so inexpensive? Amazon engineered the Fire to compete with the big boys like the iPad as well as other popular tablets. The retail price alone causes it to be a competitor. The functionality is fabulous. The downfall would have to be in the restrictions put on the Kindle Fire by Amazon. Customers can only download and install apps from the Amazon App Store unless you sideload them by linking the Fire to your personal computer. Amazon conveniently does not include the cable needed to do this with the Fire. Thankfully, if you own a 3rd generation Kindle, the cord provided with that device works or you can get one separately on, that's right, Amazon's website.

The largest provider of Android apps, the Google Android Market, won't work on the Kindle Fire without major manipulation that will void the warranty. Furthermore, anyone who has used an iPad will spot the lag in the Android Os. Then again, the performance has been significantly improved in the Android 4.0 OS. Some will determine this makes the Kindle Fire a substandard device. Others will determine that such small things make it worthy of its low price. Provided you can get around those few things, then the Kindle Fire may be the device for you.




About the Author:



No comments:

Post a Comment