Kindle Fire?

Kindle Fire looks to be an excellent Android tablet, and it's sold at a loss (to make a profit by selling you books etc.) so the quality doesn't reflect the low price. It's running a heavily modified version of Android 2, which is actually for phones not tablets, but when you see what Amazon have done with it you'll be impressed; it has an excellent interface and everything.

It won't have the amazing app store etc. that the iPad has though. Depends what she wants to do with it. It's going to be great for reading books, obviously, since that's the main focus of it, but Android is also great for web browsing and other services. The 7" size and portrait default orientation will mean upscaling the vast majority of Android apps (since they're still mostly only phone apps on the market) will be fine.

The Kindle interface makes it much easier to use and more attractive to non-computer-whizzes, unlike vanilla Android which can be a little too technical for casual tablet/smartphone users.

Take a look at different Kindle Fire videos on YouTube. This is a good one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugy3pQWSUGo

 

I currently own a kindle fire and honestly I love it. It depends on what she wants to use it for. Despite the fact that it is an ebook reader, I never put it down I have everything on it, games, random applications, books, etc. which is really cool for it's price.

It's battery lasts for quite a while. It also has Wifi which means you can access any hotspot and browse wherever you are, but I think the newer one has 3G (not quite sure about that). The screen is not too small and not too big, making it easier to hold while reading and carry around.

I'm happy with mine, carry it everywhere, and since I read a lot, it comes in handy ^_^

Hope you find this useful

 

I must say I was tempted. Got a Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 in the end (perfect size and weight, IMO), and I find it lighter and better than my iPad. I use a normal Kindle for books, the e-ink is much better for long periods of reading than any backlit screen will ever be. Just yeah, know that since it's designed mainly for book reading and movie viewing, and is using Android 2, there will be a lot of tablet features missing in favour of more of a 'large mobile phone' interface.

 

I'd recommend buying it for her only if she currently uses Amazon services or doesn't mind using them almost exclusively.

Also bear in mind the Amazon app store is NOT the Android app store, and as such the contents differ. Every app and each update has to be approved for Kindle compatibility before it'll appear on the Amazon store, meaning you may find they're not hosting the most current version.

A worst case scenario could mean an app you love on Android just never makes it to the Amazon store, or an update to an existing app renders it incompatible with Kindle and you're stuck with the older version permanently.

 

My dad's got one - it's great for the price.

I'd highly recommend them to anyone who just needs a WiFi device to read email & browse the web.

Only real downside to them is that they have very little storage space - they're pretty much catered to be a media consumption device to be used with WiFi handy.

 

When you're talking about a 200$ tablet/reader, I think it offers a lot for its price. As for the storage part, there is a cloud you can store on, plus even if you download applications on it, they take very little space. I have more than 30 games taking up under 1 gigabyte. Even apps that are considerably big on the apple app store are for some reason smaller on the amazon store, running in the same quality and everything.

Plus no offense, but personally if I got this for my mom, I don't think she's be using it to download apps and games and update It'd take her at least a month to figure out how to use it xD

 

My Grandma got one and she loves it. I know a lot about because I had to teach her how to use it without previous experience haha

 

Hehe, my mom really, really hated computers. Have no idea how she'd react to a tablet.

Storage isn't all about apps - try telling our 3-year-old that she can't watch My Little Pony because we don't have WiFi on the road.

PS> Welcome to Touch Arcade & say "Hi" to that metalcasket guy!

 

I agree about the wifi thing on the road xD I'd freak out, ask metalcasket xD

Plus, he's the one who's supposed to be saying hi to me hahahaha xD

Thank you for the welcome See you around ^_^

 

Have a Kindle Fire. Don't like it. $250 paper weight. It's so bad that I couldn't in good conscience try to pawn it off to someone else. There are better options for a 7-inch Android tablet, $50-100 more, but you often get what you pay for in life. I would try ASUS. Very dependable hardware developer.

 

I'll trade you a paper weight for it

 

I think for the money it costs the kindle fire is an amazingly good deal I have to admit I wouldn't buy one myself though as I prefer eink for my reading and if I was going to buy a tablet I just can't resist the cutting edge.

I'd definitely recommend the fire to others who just want simple content and usage and at the price they can't go far wrong. I think it's a waste people pay hundreds for the latest ipad then only use it to occasionally look at a webpage.

 

Strange when I set up my grandmas it took me through this whole tutorial. I had to sign her in and stuff set up wifi and her email... wierd did you google it?

 

Sounds annoying presuming your on the right wifi network and have the correct wireless password in and everything maybe try resetting the router.
If that doesn't help I'd either ring Amazon tech support or start browsing around kindle fire specific forums there are probably a few by now.