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Amazon Kindle Fire HD Review

REVIEW

First: I love it. It's almost too much fun. I go to read, but wind up watching a movie. There are so many choices, I get distracted. For the money, for its intended purposes, assuming you understand what it does and doesn't do, it's the best deal you can get. It's an entire entertainment system in one affordable compact package. As a reader, it's great, although adjusting it to the level of brightness that suits you is a bit of trial and error. It's easy to adjust, but my eyes are picky. For just plain reading, my older 2nd gen Kindle is easier. The sound is very good. Hard to believe you can get that much sound out of such tiny speakers. Impressive. The quality of the video is superb, much better than I expected. I find that I actually do watch movies in bed with my little 7" Fire HD. Because I was already a Prime member, they have so much available for free it will be a long time before I feel I need to buy anyhthing more. I have a huge library for Kindle which I can use either unit or any of my three computers. These migrate automatically. The new Kindle HD links to the older of my 2 Audible accounts. They cannot yet link an Audible account that isn't under the same email address as your Amazon account NOR have they the technology to link multiple Audible accounts, period. IF you have mulitple Audible account under the same email address as your Amazon account, they can consolidate the libraries, but it will be one single account. They said they are working on this ... and you have to call Audible for this help, though Audible is very good about tech help and always have been, even before Amazon bought them. Audibleis working on solving this, but don't hold your breath. The device is great for listening to audiobooks, far better for me than an MP3 player because I hate earphones. The Kindle is small enough to carry in a purse and not heavy. Issues: 16GB is plenty ... unless you want to download HD movies. Streaming them (what I have so far done) uses no memory, so no problem. Regular "print" books are small; you can carry a whole library with you if you want. It's when you get to music and audiobooks (or the aforementioned HD movies) that you realize there's a a bit of a problem. You cannot stream audiobooks: you have to download them to the device. Nor is there any way to add memory. Kindle has no slot for an SD chip or port for a flash drive. Why not? Wouldn't it have been a no-brainer to include a port or slot for a card or flash drive? That, in my opinion, was a bad mistake. You cannot expand beyond the device's embedded memory. Period. No options. Buying the 32 GB version moves the wall, but doesn't remove it. Amazon should add a port for memory, either flash or a card. They should address this issue soon. You need to understand the limits of the device, what the advertisements don't explain. Audiobooks can be large. A really long book takes up quite a bit a space. You can load a few books at a time if they are normal-length books, but not 57 hours of "Lord of the Rings," for example. After you listen to a book, delete it. Then download the next. Unlike when you download to your computer from Audible, you cannot download a multi part book in sections. It's all or nothing. A book that is in your Audible library in several parts, which these days is any book longer than 11 hours, will download in a single piece to the Kindle. If the book you want to load is LOTR or Winds of War, make sure you have enough room. You can store everything you aren't actively listening to, watching, or reading on Amazon's (free) cloud servers, so deleting content isn't losing it, just moving it off the device. This is well and good as long as you have WiFi. It gets stickier if you are on the road and WiFi connections are not available. If you travel a great deal, road warriors may want to wait and get the version that comes with 3G (available in late November I believe). If you are mainly looking to use it on the road, get the 3G. I have 3G on my older Kindle; it's great when you want a book, but don't have a WiFi connection. It will automatically switch to 3G in the absence of a WiFi network. But older Kindles don't do all the other cool stuff. They are strictly e-book readers. Very good ones, but dedicated to a single purpose. You can pretty much whatever you want to do on your new Kindle (not writing or editing beyond email length), but you can't store everything on the device. You can't download your whole Audible library to your Kindle or download lots of HD or other movies plus miscellaneous other content. One or two movies, max, a few audiobooks, plenty of regular books ... and other content as needed ... but not everything. It's not meant for that anymore than is an iPad, which has similar space limits. If you are in range of a WiFi connections, it's no problem. At home, it's a non-issue. When/if we are traveling, I will have to choose what I want to take with me. The manual is poorly written and incomplete. As a professional tech writer, I will say straight out that they need to hire a professional and do it right. There's no excuse for not having at least the basic information available in the online manual. If the device was more intuitive, if the menus (such as they are) were logically arranged, they might not need it, but as it stands, they definitely do need a manual. Most things are very easy to do, but finding the menu that does it or the information on how to do it is NOT easy. Yes, Amazon has great customer and tech support. Real life peoople who really know the device and will stay on the phone with you until your battery runs out ... but who wants to have to call customer service to figure out how to delete a book or movie? Or for that matter, turn the unit on? It's stupidly simple to do all this stuff, assuming you can find the manual at all (I had to call for that, too), you will not find any listing under the words "delete," "remove", "turn on," etcetera. It's the first rule of tech writing to explain the basic stuff up front without having to search for it, and certainly should not need to call a hotline for this information. Just hire a competent tech writer. We work cheap, really. Give employment to someone who needs it! I'm still figuring out where various functions are and how to make them work. They do work, but the figuring them out is anti-intuitive. I bought the $199 version that has advertising. I'm not finding them intrusive. You can get rid of them, even after you've bought it, for $15 if they annoy you, but they only show up as an offers menu or on the splash screen before you open to the contents. If you already are a member of the Amazon community, if you have Prime, already have a Kindle library, and/or an Audible account, it's the best deal in town. I have yet to want something that Amazon doesn't have, usually cheaper than anyone else, so for me, it was ideal. Absolutely no reason for me to look elsewhere, though I did actually look at everything else before I bought this. If you want everything, spend some much bigger money and get a tablet. Go for broke and get an iPad. They're cool. But remember: if your primary issue is READING, a tablet computer is not as good for reading as any reader is. Tablets are shinier and more reflective; they are useless in the sun. Any Kindle, is better for reading. Decide what you want to do. Many people have a tablet AND a Kindle (or other reader). One size may not "fit all" for you. The Fire is not a iPad, but it's pretty close and a heck of a lot less money. If you want to read, watch a movie or TV show, listen to audio, do email, see what's happening on Twitter or Facebook -- or any website, really -- it will do that and more. You can transfer content directly to the Kindle USB cable from your computer or store it in Amazon's cloud, then move it to your Kindle. I've got three computers: laptop, desktop, and mini, so I am not going to worry about storing documents and photographs on my Kindle, though I may take them up on using some of their storage space. Photographs are another thing that can overload a small device fast. Be sensible and reasonable in your expectations. It's a fine device, esecially for the price. It really does 95% of what Amazon promises, though not necessarily quite the way you expected. Plan on calling at least once or twice, if only because the menus and manual are inadequate. This problem is NOT unique to Kindle. I have some expensive cameras I still can't fully use because the manual is useless and they don't have friendly 24/7 service. Thumbs up for quality, sound, video, speed (download and delete speeds are breathtakingly fast). It's also a nice looking device, compact and the accessories, finally, are affordable, even cheap. You will NOT have to pay $50 for a case this time. You can find nice ones for as little as $4 or $5 dollars. Buy the Quick Charger ($9.99). Worth it. Whether or not you'll need a stylus? I bought some inexpensive ones, but I never use them. The touch screen is sensitive (sometimes too sensitive) and easier with fingers than a stylus. If you have big hands, the stylus might be easier for you. It's a personal thing. Try it before you make a big investment. A cheap stylus will work just as well as an expensive one. Fingerprints: not bad. I got lens wipes at Walmart. They are great for the Kindle, my camera, my computer AND my eyeglasses. Protective screen? There goes your HD and the sensitivity of the touchcreen. I can send you a bunch free; they came with other things and are pointless. Don't bother. Absolutely do get a case for protection if nothing else. I recommend one that turns into an easel so you can watch movies or TV hands free and prefereably, also turns it on when you open it, turns it off when you close it. The on-off button is small and hard to find. My $8 case turns the whole unit on and off and is a standing easel. Problem fixed. It cost $7.99. The Kindle wakes instantly; a zero second startup. The touchscreen is sensitive and I often find that I've started downloading when all I was trying to do was navigate. Amazon needs to address this. It's annoying. Getting information about a book or movie is tricky and to avoid the issue, I go to the Amazon store and look it up there. They need more and better menus. And it's still the best deal in town!

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Kindle Fire HD 7", Dolby Audio, Dual-Band Wi-Fi, 16 GB - Includes Special Offers