Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Some Kindle Fire HD Observations

This last weekend my parents were in visiting, and my Mom brought her brand new Kind Fire HD. While I didn't get to play with it a lot, I did manage to make a few observations:

  • As a programmer, I can see the setup process was relatively streamlined. Yet, I'm glad I was there to help my Mom make it through the whole process. Had she been doing it solo, I'm not sure how easy it would have been.
  • Quality wise, the device is excellent. It looks and feels quite polished.
  • The naming is awfully confusing. Amazon has successfully educated my Mom (and I assume others) that a Kindle is for reading books. I surprised her when I explained she could Skype and run other apps from it. It was certainly a pleasant surprise, but a surprise none the less.
  • Overdrive was easy to setup, and my Mom quickly figured out how to rent and read books from her local library. Free books from authors she wants to read -- this was perfect. This is definitely her first killer app on the device. It also made me especially happy to know that she could make good use of the device without being forced to purchase stuff (be it books or other content).
  • Skype works well on the device. The lack of a forward facing camera was the reason we held off on getting her the first edition of the Kindle Fire. I'm glad we waited.
  • I thought the Fire would be an especially useful device for my Mom because she doesn't have an Android Smart Phone. Now she has a platform to run Android apps from, and she doesn't need to give up her well-understood text'ing friendly cell phone.
  • I didn't play with the device long enough to see any negatives. Especially when you consider the relatively low cost of the device, there's an awful lot to like.

Any observations you'd like to share?

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