Amazon's Kindle Fire and New Kindle E-Readers Closeup

Oooh, bright shiny tech objects that I really, really want, but don't need!

http://techland.time.com/2011/09/29/ama ... s-closeup/
Amazon's Kindle Fire and New Kindle E-Readers Closeup
By Jared Newman on September 29, 2011

Amazon came out firing at its press event yesterday with the Kindle Fire tablet and two new Kindle e-readers. Although there weren't a lot of surprises in terms of tech specs—we've heard rumors of the Amazon tablet and a new Kindle before—Amazon did manage to keep images of its new products under wraps until now.

Let's take a closer look at Amazon's new Kindle family.

Kindle Fire
http://techland.time.com/kindle-fire-tablet/

The big news, of course, was the Amazon Kindle Fire, which at $199 easily undercuts Apple's $499 iPad. It's a smaller tablet, with a 7-inch display, but that has advantages of its own, like the ability to hold it in one hand or type with your thumbs. Other specs include a dual-core processor, 8 GB of built-in storage and up to 7.5 hours of video playback.

The Kindle Fire is based on Android, but significant modifications give this tablet its own look and feel. The search bar on top can access the Web, local content and anything you've stored on Amazon's cloud servers. Not pictured here, but also a big deal, is the Amazon Silk web browser , which supposedly taps Amazon servers to render web pages faster.

Kindle Touch
http://techland.time.com/kindle-fire-ta ... -e-reader/

Following in the footsteps of Barnes & Noble's latest Nook, the Kindle Touch uses an infrared sensor to detect fingers along its 6-inch E-Ink display. A feature called "EasyReach" allocates most of the touch screen to turning pages, while small strips on the left side and top side of the screen bring up the previous page and the menu, respectively.

With Special Offers—essentially ads and deals that appear when the device is idle—the Kindle Touch will cost $99. Without those offers, it'll cost $139. There's also a 3G version for $149 with Special Offers, and $189 without.

Basic Kindle
http://techland.time.com/kindle-fire-ta ... ic-kindle/

If touch screens aren't your bag, a non-touch Kindle is available starting today. This model is 30% lighter and 18% smaller than the previous generation Kindle, thanks in large part to its removal of the physical keyboard in favor of a directional pad, which you can use to (slowly) select each letter. This Kindle costs $79 with Special Offers, and $109 without them.

A review of the new Kindle:

http://www.wired.com/reviews/2011/10/kindle/all/1
Look, But Don’t Touch
Reviewed by Michael Calore Email Author · October 11, 2011

I’ve been testing it for five days, and I can tell you that as an e-book reader, it’s better than the old Kindle in almost every way. It’s about 20 percent lighter, weighing six ounces to the older Kindle’s eight and a half ounces. It’s also about 30 percent smaller, though the screen is exactly the same size. The new Kindle’s screen does look slightly larger when you place it next to an older one, but that’s only an optical illusion caused by the new beveled edge around the screen. Other improvements include a slight boost in page-turning speed, as well as new page-turning buttons that are not only more satisfying to click, but more attractively integrated into the bevel that runs around the entire edge of the device.

But the real win here is the smaller size. It slips into jacket pockets and pants pockets the older Kindle couldn’t. It’s also easier to hold while reading, and the absence of the keyboard results in fewer unintentional button presses.

So. No keyboard? I’m not going to lie — typing anything is a chore. Thankfully, you won’t need to do this very often.

However, as an e-book reader, this new Kindle has everything else you’d want. It’s lighter, faster, cheaper, and easier to carry around.

The reason he titled it "Look, but Don't Touch" is because he tested the cheapest model, the non-touch screen one, but when he'd pull it out in public, everyone did the same thing right away - tried to repeatedly treat it as a touch-screen version. (The Kindle Touch versions aren't available yet, so no reviews out yet). I did find out that audio is not available on the base Kindle anymore, so if you like to listen to your books, you'll have to go with a pricier model for that.

He also reviews the new reading light built-in case for it too - sounds like they did it right!