Amazon's Kindle Fire from the start has been situated as the budget tablet. Its specs rarely are found to measure up to those of its competitors, but the price, the current edition offered at $229, is so appealing it has managed to leverage a spot in the market.
As expected, with the coming of the holiday season, so too comes Amazon's new shot at the brass ring. The 7-inch Kindle Fire HDX hit the market on October 18 followed by the larger 8.9-inch screen version in November. There are a couple interesting additions, such as the free Mayday feature, on this Android-based system.
If though you're looking for dramatic improvements in functions and capacity, you'll be disappointed. There's not a lot of enhancement with this third-generation model. Indeed, some might even think they're getting ripped off. The software here is based on Google's Android system, but absent all of Google's apps and services.
Rather, these new Kindle Fire owners have to download any apps from Amazon. (This all reminiscence, by the way, of the whole mess around activating the Flash Player , which does not come activated, to the perturbation of many new owners.) And it's not just a convenience problem, but also a selection one: compared to nearly a million apps for the Android, Kindle Fire only has around 85,000 available. Nor is it merely numbers; many of the most popular Android apps, such as Google Maps, Gmail, and YouTube, are not on offer.
This brings us to another annoying feature of the Kindle Fire HDX, like its predecessor, its constantly trying to sell you goods from Amazon. If you hold your mouse over anything - app, book, video, whatever - your friendly Amazon salesman jumps up with a suggestion of something similar you should consider purchasing.
I find this immensely annoying and distracting. Obviously, it's a matter of personal taste. Some folks, I expect, find real value in this endless exposure to new product opportunities. For me, it just gets in the way of what I'm trying to do. Like commercial television, though, this is the monetizing strategy: you suffer through the ads to get the product at such a low price.
It's not all doom and gloom, though. There are some genuine improvements. Happiest of all is a noticeable reduction in how buggy is the software. This has always been a problem with this tablet and while Amazon hasn't entirely remedied the situation, the reduction of glitches is much welcomed. Also, a thumbs-up for the "carousel" style view finder: it allows you to find apps, movies, books or any other offering with ease and a visual flair. The navigation bar at the bottom of the screen accesses the full assortment of content on the tablet.
And let us not forget what some people might find the coolest feature of all. At the press of a button this Kindle Fire version provides you the Mayday service, in which you are immediately hooked up with a live service representative. The rep appears in a corner of your tablet's screen and addresses any problems or concerns you have. And your little corner friend, who you'll know on a first name bases, can even take control of your Kindle Fire, should that prove the most efficient manner of resolving your issue. There's no question this is a cool feature and the commitment to customer service makes a statement
The thing is, though (and call me Joe-cynical if you like), but isn't the point of these tablets the creation of a distinctively user-friendly work environment? It's almost as though the Mayday name was less about the Fire owner calling out to Amazon than Amazon calling out Mayday to the market. It's like, okay, we admit, we couldn't do any better, but, hey, here's this cool workaround our inability to come up with a tablet most people could figure out on their own.
At the end of the day, I'll say the same thing about this newest version Kindle Fire as I have about its forerunners. If you're into big time, long term loyalty to Amazon and its products -- and nothing is wrong with that -- you'll find some appreciated improvements in the newer version. If your priority, however, is a good budget tablet, you can do better .
As expected, with the coming of the holiday season, so too comes Amazon's new shot at the brass ring. The 7-inch Kindle Fire HDX hit the market on October 18 followed by the larger 8.9-inch screen version in November. There are a couple interesting additions, such as the free Mayday feature, on this Android-based system.
If though you're looking for dramatic improvements in functions and capacity, you'll be disappointed. There's not a lot of enhancement with this third-generation model. Indeed, some might even think they're getting ripped off. The software here is based on Google's Android system, but absent all of Google's apps and services.
Rather, these new Kindle Fire owners have to download any apps from Amazon. (This all reminiscence, by the way, of the whole mess around activating the Flash Player , which does not come activated, to the perturbation of many new owners.) And it's not just a convenience problem, but also a selection one: compared to nearly a million apps for the Android, Kindle Fire only has around 85,000 available. Nor is it merely numbers; many of the most popular Android apps, such as Google Maps, Gmail, and YouTube, are not on offer.
This brings us to another annoying feature of the Kindle Fire HDX, like its predecessor, its constantly trying to sell you goods from Amazon. If you hold your mouse over anything - app, book, video, whatever - your friendly Amazon salesman jumps up with a suggestion of something similar you should consider purchasing.
I find this immensely annoying and distracting. Obviously, it's a matter of personal taste. Some folks, I expect, find real value in this endless exposure to new product opportunities. For me, it just gets in the way of what I'm trying to do. Like commercial television, though, this is the monetizing strategy: you suffer through the ads to get the product at such a low price.
It's not all doom and gloom, though. There are some genuine improvements. Happiest of all is a noticeable reduction in how buggy is the software. This has always been a problem with this tablet and while Amazon hasn't entirely remedied the situation, the reduction of glitches is much welcomed. Also, a thumbs-up for the "carousel" style view finder: it allows you to find apps, movies, books or any other offering with ease and a visual flair. The navigation bar at the bottom of the screen accesses the full assortment of content on the tablet.
And let us not forget what some people might find the coolest feature of all. At the press of a button this Kindle Fire version provides you the Mayday service, in which you are immediately hooked up with a live service representative. The rep appears in a corner of your tablet's screen and addresses any problems or concerns you have. And your little corner friend, who you'll know on a first name bases, can even take control of your Kindle Fire, should that prove the most efficient manner of resolving your issue. There's no question this is a cool feature and the commitment to customer service makes a statement
The thing is, though (and call me Joe-cynical if you like), but isn't the point of these tablets the creation of a distinctively user-friendly work environment? It's almost as though the Mayday name was less about the Fire owner calling out to Amazon than Amazon calling out Mayday to the market. It's like, okay, we admit, we couldn't do any better, but, hey, here's this cool workaround our inability to come up with a tablet most people could figure out on their own.
At the end of the day, I'll say the same thing about this newest version Kindle Fire as I have about its forerunners. If you're into big time, long term loyalty to Amazon and its products -- and nothing is wrong with that -- you'll find some appreciated improvements in the newer version. If your priority, however, is a good budget tablet, you can do better .
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