Opinion: How Kindle Fire Could Validate Apple's iPad

really do you think is good to judge them

Looks like Amazon has a very refined device on their hand. Looks to be design specifically for media consumption which overlaps with some of the IPad's capabilities but does not completely compete with IPad. Basically, they found their space and will probably be very successful.

Very nice

You really don't know anything about amazon or apple. Please stop making these dumb articles.

Apple has a great app store, universal compatibility , and a big user base. Android has a great custom experience, better hardware, and a great mod community.

WINNER: DARK SOULS

The ipad got where it is for 2 reasons. 1 it is a very good device. and 2 most importantly, the android tablet makers lost their chance to get in in time and when they did they thought they could charge a fortune for a device hoping apple haters would jump on the band wagon.

Only until Asus and Acer came out with their tablets and priced them at levels that made them competetive to Apple, did the android tablets become feasible. Unfortunately, the ipad2 came out a couple months before them and many people who where waiting to buy a decent android tablet got frustrated and bought an Ipad2.

Maybe the kindle fire could get people wanting to buy android tablets for a change.

While I don't like to spend much time listening to this journalists ideas, as it's very warped from reality, I do believe the Kinkdle Fire will succeed. I base this on its primary purpose. It's designed to read books, or at least, that what most people will think of when buying one. Tablets are perfect for this purpose. I don't personally believe they have a lot of advantages for most people, but reading a book is one that it would shine at, as long as the battery life is good.

I have a question. ¿if i do not live in USA, are the movies and the music (and more) disable?.

And omit a whole new segment of the market? you really don't know anything. the resolution [1020x600] is exactly what the NOOK offers, and that's the same price segment they're aiming for. they aren't trying to conform to your needs, but more of EVERYONE's needs. besides, an IPS display is MORE than enough at that resolution. very impressive for that price. it may very well eat away at ipad sales.

[1024x600]*

ips display is MORE than enough at that price***

My only concern with the Fire is the small screen, which makes this device almost exclusively media-consumptive. At 10", the iPad can at least pretend to get a little work done, especially with an external physical keyboard. In essence, this will be exclusively a toy instead of mostly a toy with the excuse of maybe getting some work done on it.

well we'll probably see a more impressive bigger brother [kindle fire dx?] in 3 months, hopefully it's not more than $100 on top of this one

I see that Kindle Fire can invalidate Apple's iPod Touch

I do think they really needed to include a front facing camera for a complete tablet experience. Not for pictures, only for video chat. They could have worked with Skype to have the app already installed and ready to go upon launch.

What's with all these idiots trying to analyse why the ipad dominates the tablet market? It's so simple I'm constantly tearing my hair out at the absurdity of opinion articles like this one all over the net. The ipad is so popular because it's apple. People never ask why shoes that are as good as Nikes don't sell as much as Nikes, because everyone knows it's a brand thing. Why is this so hard to understand?

Also, customers of regular tablets are very considered about the technology they buy. Apple customers are not. If there is a new Apple device they will buy it. Must I cite the research showing Apple-user brain activity is comparable to religious ferver?

Amazon's own store has music, movies and TV shows that are just as numerous and cheaper and the Android apps are evenly matched with Apple.

Universal compatability - HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Big user base - Since when has the ability to convince large numbers of people to pay over the odds for inferior hardware considered a plus point for anyone other than Steve Jobs or Apple stock holders?

BRAINWASH the consumers to think that your product is good (or at least better than the competitors')...

Both are big companies.
Both companies' names start with 'A'.
Both released crappy devices at first.
Both took more than a couple of devices to make a better one.

Too bad Apple would probably release a 7" iMiniPad, iScratchPad, iPhotoFrame or iRetardblet and wipe out the competition, invalidating the vali... whatever. End of the useless comment.

The iPad got where it is because it has a strong following of people with enough disposable income to buy something they don't need badly for several hundred dollars. It really has nothing to do with being revolutionary or a "better product". Android buyers are the type of people who rationalize a purchase and can't justify spending that much for what the device offers. Devices that are priced lower but might not be on equal hardware or might take extra work to bring full functionality out of are what they're looking for. They want the better value. HP Touchpad's price drop showed this to the manufacturers, so this might be the direction many non-Apple tablets go in. They made a mistake thinking they could compete at Apple's price range when there was plenty of room to compete in the lower price range.




They're going to release a 10 inch version of the Fire next year.


Ultimately, it comes down to understanding and getting a device which has the hardware you need. If you don't mind squinting, don't pay for a 10 inch screen. If you don't use video chat on the go, who cares about a front facing camera?. If you don't use map apps or other location sensitive features, you don't really need GPS. Google maps can sort of figure directions and location based on wifi anyway. If you don't want to use the device far away from WiFi areas and don't mind some loss of security, you don't need 3G. You're leashing yourself to a cell company with 3G anyway and will be bandwidth capped on it. These other companies can take advantage of the fact Apple prefers to tell it's customers what they need and instead give customers different options to fit their needs.

iPad2 could be flashy - I think it's mostly useless for a price, it's a flashy digital frame.. but it's my opinion.
Amazon Fire seem interresting with an interresting price.
200$ VS 600$... it's a no brainer.

The Kindle Fire creates a solid $200 statement against the $500-600 high performers. Now there is a $300-400 gap to be smartly filled. I think the price will come down on high end tablets.

If Amazon can sale an important quantity of Kindle Fires (and I think they will) this may produce a value change on even higher end 10' (consumer) tablets. Even if it is not competing directly to the 9-10' iPad and Galaxy tablets the Fire will accentuate the price scale differences on all the tablet business.

Now is more than notorious that when the next quad-core tablets will be ready many consumers wont even need the bigger performance a quad-core and 10' 300 dpi display will produce at the price they will be. What Apple, Samsung and others will do? Abandon completely the more basic, lets say dual-core market? And now there will be a huge $200-600 price conscious consumers wanting to fill the $400 gap with different options.

With the Kindle Fire there is a solid $200 tablet to start considering your options. How many users will only need/afford to consume media on a smaller simpler tablet and buy from Amazon versus those wanting a more robust tablet to replace their very simple PC requirements? The Fire is this device that will test those 2 big different needs and it creates a considerable $400 price contrast against the solid performers on the $500-600 segment.

I lost you at universal compatibility

Android has better hardware? Are you being so simple to 'compare the M-Pees?' or the number of cores? The quality of the Apple hardware has historically been far superior, and still is, to be honest. Performance isn't an issue because all the apps run, and you get far better battery life. As for 'great mod community' - who cares about that?

If Eee Pad Trasformer was released at the price of the very first Eee PC, I would have gotten one by now! I am too poor to buy a tablet that costs more than my Core i5 notebook!

I've preferred not to criticize the trend of Wolfgang bring in Apple into every single opinion piece he writes, but I have to question the whole point of having Apple in the topic title. Essentially, this article could have been written in its entirety without Apple.

For instance, I fail to see how Amazon's success can validate or disprove the iPad. They are two different things from two different products. Amazon's offering isn't even similar to the offerings from Apple.

In short, the Apple in the title is an attention grabber, not a necessity in the story.

For example the first Galaxy S had a better hardware than the iPhone 4. They had the exact same CPU but the Galaxy S had a better GPU.

I'd say the Galaxy S is about the same... (I have one) the OLED screen is beautiful - but the resolution on an iPhone 4 is also beautiful. Yet, there is NO reason to make a higher res 4" OLED display... that would be awesome.

But the support software for a GalaxyS (like many Androids) is very lacking. In order for me to PUT Froyo onto my Samasung, I had to use an old XP notebook because the updated DOESN'T work with Windows7 - WTF?! And while Froyo fixed many things, like GPS and such... its also downgraded some of the functionality that I kind of have the urge to go BACK... Like WHAT IDIOT at Google thought that the PhoneLogs should include texting? How about this... JUST Phone Logs would be super great. The TEXT APP shows all the texting... stupid stuff like that is a reason why *I* bought an iPad over an Android tablet.


Making up the price of $600 is silly. YOU know the starting price is $480~500 for the base mode.
And since the breakdown price of an iPad is $350 - it can't be sold for under $400. I think its great what Amazon is doing... they are selling them at costs to make money on the content. Which is EXACTLY what Samsung, HP, Blackberry, Motorola, Asus, etc CANNOT do... other than apps. I think the Kindle Fire will be the first true #2 tablet on the market.

@ Wolfgang : You sir, are one of the few people WHO figured out why most other tablets fail or do poorly against the iPad. At best, Samsung is selling 200,000 for every 2million iPads. Content, ecosystem, ease of use will determine such a product.

Er... no. You are tearing your hair out for no good reason and you are wrong.
This article is mostly about the FIRE and talks about WHY the iPad dominates... When 8~9 months ago, the experts predicted that the iPad would be reduced to about 40% of the market by now. NOT!
The iPad (while not perfect) is pretty much idiot proof. Its super easy to use, it works, iTunes works (and I don't like iTunes), they have content and apps. So when the Touchpad and Playbook enter the market with $500 devices that are flawed and little content - of course they WOULD fail. The value HP had was $100 for a dead platform, which is fine for media player and web browser. It was never worth $500... perhaps $300 MSRP would have worked - but without content, its sold at a loss.

Hell, the HP TouchPad (which has good and bad ideas) came with a non-functional single cam built in. Its non functional because only SKYPE would work with it. Its on-screen keyboard rocks! Hope Apple and Android adopt it (or steal it).

For my next tablet, like next year... I like what Lenovo has built with their Thinkpad Tablet... but the 16:9 screen sucks for web pages (like ALL Android tablets) but unless Android has is more stable and usable... I may just get an iPad3. Not because of Apple... but because of how the Android setup is not good enough. The screen is a big one for me.

(Sorry, forgot to add this part)
A photoframe? First of all, most photoframes are pretty crappy low-res devices... with an 8" screen with 800x600 res, most look like crap compared to my 4" Samsung... which has better color and contrast.

Lets compare a $500 iPad2 to a $200 Kodak PhotoFrame [KPF] (not the usual $50~80 crap).
Screen: 10.4" KPF is 800x600, lower than iPad's 9.7" 1024x768.
RAM: iPad = 16GB, KPF = 512mb - it counts on the user adding his own 4~64GB memory card.
Network: iPad = 802.11 ABGN & bluetooth / KPF = WiFi with email attachment function.
Battery life: iPad = 8~10 hours / KPF = AC power (batteries are expensive)
Cameras: iPad = 2 / KPF = none

Things YOU can't do with a Digital Picture Frame: Surf web, run apps (other than an Alarm clock), play games, do work, read documents, take photos and videos, work anywhere, play music, watch movies. So yeah, for $300 extra, you're getting a lot more features.

Mind you, Picture Frame viewers is nice, other than the low-res. I have one - sits on a table and does its thing.

Another reason Apple does well, is the after-market support. Go to any store and look for accessories beyond headphones... and there is 100x more options for people to choose from.