Kindle Fire

Is the Kindle Fire for you? With over 9,000 Amazon Likes, it well may be. See my review for specs, extras, details, and the Fire vs iPad and Nook Color comparison.

Specs Overview

For a mere $199, you get a slick 7 inch tablet with a 1024×600 (169 ppi) resolution display featuring extra-durable Gorilla glass and wide-angle viewing. The Fire has 8GB of inbuilt storage (about 6.5GB for content), plus 5GB free cloud storage. The size and weight are of an average 7″ tablet – 7.5 x 4.7 x 0.45 inches and 14.6 ounces. The KF boasts a speedy dual core processor, with 512 RAM. The battery life is 8 hours – very good considering the high screen refresh rate that decreases flickering and reduces eye strain.

Content and Extras

The KF is not just a tablet – it’s the Amazon tablet designed to be a media powerhouse. This device comes strongly integrated with Amazon content. First off, you are provided with 1 month of free Prime. This means that you can access thousands of movies and TV shows (unlimited streaming), borrow one book a month from the Kindle Owners’ Library (Water for Elephants, the Hunger Games, etc.), and get your Amazon purchases shipped free with their 2-day shipping. When the trial is over, the Prime is available for $79/year. Second, the KF is seamlessly integrated with 5GB of your free cloud storage, plus your Amazon digital content in the cloud. The device makes it easy to get more content from Amazon, including videos, books, movies, magazines, and music. Finally, you get to download one paid app a day for free, and they are great apps.

Display

The KFire has an exceptional display for 2011 tablets: 1024x600px, with a high pixel density and IPS technology to view at most angles. It features a highly damage-resistant Gorilla Glass. Colors are vivid yet accurate, and videos can blow you away. Even texts look awesome, considering that LCDs have glare and aren’t as great for reading as eInk.

Touch-Screen

The Kindle Fire has just one physical button (the power switch), everything else is done via its screen. Different people had different experiences with it. Some deem it imperfect; others state it has zero glitches. It may take some time to get used to it, especially for those used to another touch-screen device or those who never used a touchscreen before. It’s always a learning curve.

Web Browser

The Kindle Fire’s web browser – Silk – was heavily marketed as extremely fast. As more users browse the web via their Fires, it should become very fast. As of now it rates right in the middle. There is a way to speed it up: disable “Accelerated Browsing”. Doing so should put it on par with the fastest browsers in tablets.

Email

The Kindle Fire comes with a default email app, and most people like it a lot. It looks slick and is very easy to setup and use. It supports Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, POP3, and more. The app manages multiple email accounts well. If you need support for MS Exchange, you will need to download the free “Exchange By TouchDown” app.

Kindle Fire 3G

Even though there’s no 3G version available, the Kindle Fire can be turned into a 3G device by creating a personal hot spot on your smartphone. Alternatively, this can be achieved with a portable 3G router. This would enable you to browse the web, stream the Prime videos and access your Amazon cloud storage, when you are away from WiFi.

VS Nook Color

Comparing the Kindle Fire with the $199 Nook Color, the former wins in most aspects. The Fire is smaller and lighter, its processor is more powerful, and the Gorilla Glass wins over the NC’s technology. The NC’s advantage is expandable memory, but B&N doesn’t offer paid cloud plans. The B&N app selection is much smaller. The interface is a matter of preference – the KF is slick, the NC is traditional. Both can be rooted. The Nook Color supports ePub, but it’s not that important now that Amazon has Overdrive public library lending. Note: the $249 Nook Color 2 (Nook Tablet) is basically a copy of the Nook Color, except for twice more storage, stronger processor, twice more RAM, and a longer battery life. Note: Amazon has a superior customer service and much easier replacements than B&N.

VS iPad

While the $199 Kindle Fire is a media consumption device, the $499 iPad 2 (the cheapest one) is a creation and interaction device. The iPad is much more expensive, with many more features than the Fire: a microphone, two cameras, and Bluetooth. Unlike the Fire, it doesn’t support flash. It has a much larger 9.7″ screen and weighs 21.3 ounces, almost twice the KFire. It’s integrated with the iTunes store and Apple’s iCloud. It has 16GB of storage (about 14GB for content). The battery lasts 10 hours (2 hrs longer than the Fire). Note: for the price of one iPad 2, you can purchase 2 Kindle Fire tablets and have $100 left.