Month: November 2011

Kindle Fire Review

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Here’s my review of the Kindle Fire. Keep in mind, I’ve been an iOS user from the start and my experience using Android is limited. If you haven’t used a tablet and don’t own an iOS device, the Kindle Fire might be for you. It’s a great value at $199 and is perfect for consuming media; including TV and movies, via NetFlix and Hulu; books and music, via the Amazon store. If you’re used an iPad or iOS device, you may not be happy with some of the minor rough edges of the Kindle Fire.

Kindle Fire unboxing
Kindle Fire unboxing
Kindle Fire configuration screen
Kindle Fire configuration screen

Pros of the Kindle Fire

  • Amazon UI eliminates some complexities of Android operating system.
  • The price – $199.
  • Good quality hardware.
  • All books, music, and apps purchased from Amazon are instantly available.
  • Super simple configuration. When you turn it on, it knows who you are.

Cons of the Kindle Fire

  • 7-inch form factor is cramped. After a few days, I’m still quicker using the iPhone keyboard.
  • The spacebar is tiny and offset to the left, you really notice this in portrait mode.
  • Web browser crashes too often.
  • Lack of hardware home button and volume controls.
  • Limited device configuration, this is likely an advantage for first-time users.
  • Limited app store selection. No Facebook or Twitter app yet, but popular apps such as Pulse News, Netflix, Hulu.
  • Lack of sync options for non-cloud apps/files.
Amazon Kindle Fire lock screen
Kindle Fire lock screen

Tiny space bar on Kindle Fire
Tiny Spacebar on the Kindle Fire

Steve Jobs on life

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When you grow up you tend to get told that the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much, try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money.

That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is that everything around you that you call life was made up by people no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it. You can build your own things that other people can use.

The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing. Shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just going to live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it. I think that’s very important and however you learn that, once you learn it, you’ll want to change life and make it better.

Once you learn that, you will never be the same again.

-Steve Jobs