The Amazon Kindle Fire, an iPad competitor for $199?
First we had Desktop wars, then laptop and notebook wars, then and continuing music player and cell phone wars, and now we have tablet wars. The latest rumbling in this new go-between is the Amazon Kindle Fire, a 7″ tablet with a dual core processor, and cloud based browser acceleration, all sported at a price of just $199. The real prize here in my opinion is the price. at $199, bundled with the $90 Amazon Prime Service, gives you access to Amazon’s large streaming library, featuring, 18,000 movie titles and counting, for $213 less than the entry level iPad 2, and this is coming from a very strong Apple fan.
The Look and Feel of the Kindle Fire
I had the opportunity to pick up and play with one of these tablets at Best buy while Christmas shopping this past week, and the unit itself is, I must say, pretty nice. The 7″ screen size fit a lot nicer into my large Columbia winter coat pocket, or my khaki side knee pockets, even with an optional carrying case. The device itself has a rubbery feel, and feels much heavier compared to other kindle models. The screen is very nice, and in my opinion the unit is good enough to view movies for a few hours, but I don’t know if I could type a paper on the unit. The Kindle Fire also lacks any external video out ports, so I couldn’t hook up the Kindle fire to my 50″ LG Plasma TV either.
What the Kindle Fire does not do
When comparing the ipad to the Kindle Fire, the biggest difference in my opinion is the optional 3G service, which allows for data access while on the road. I see a device like this being a true solution for entertainment for kids in the car on long trips, except it doesn’t have 3G data to stream movies or audiobooks to the devices. If I take my wife and daughter to Florida to go to Disney World, for example, the Fire would be limited by the local storage on the device, except when stopping at a Starbucks with wifi. Likewise a trip down to see my wife’s father who lives in Southern Illinois 10 hours away would go a lot smoother with my 2 year old holding a device with limitless entertainment possibilities. A few other noticeable shortcomings include no Bluetooth, and no ad-hock network support. Essentially that means that you can’t use a Bluetooth mouse or keyboard for times when you need to be productive, and you can’t use Bluetooth, or ad-hock wifi networks for multi-player gaming with a few android devices.
Ultimately it comes down to what you need, and right now, I’m honestly just fine with my Sprint EVO 4G and my Mac Book Pro.