Amazon is rolling out Alexa voice services on Fire tablets via a new software update. The update is making its way to last year’s Fire HD 8, Fire HD 10, and regular Fire tablets, as well as this year’s Fire HD 8 offering. Once it makes its way to your own Fire tablet, you'll be able to use Alexa by pressing the on-screen home button. There's also support for linking your Echo and tablet together.
Amazon has announced a new version of its Fire HD 8 tablet, and it sounds like this refresh brings a number of hardware improvements over its predecessor. Taking a page out of Nintendo's book, Amazon has dubbed this the "All-New Fire HD 8," and aside from an improvement on the hardware side of things, this new tablet marks the first time that Alexa capabilities will be present in Amazon's Fire lineup.
Just in time to make the perfect gift for the heavy reader on your shopping list, Amazon has announced a new Reader's Edition of its Fire HD 8 tablet. It's not actually a new version of the device; it's still the latest generation of the 8-inch display Fire HD that was introduced in September, albeit in a special bundle aimed at frequent ebook readers, priced at $250.
Amazon's largest ever tablet is also the company's thinnest, and as you'd expect the Fire HD 10 does its level best to be the perfect vehicle for the Bezos empire. Promising the cutting-edge in tablet hardware, with the heavily customized ease of Amazon's Android spin-off Fire OS, and at a price that would't even get you a base-model iPad, there's certainly a lot to like about the HD 10 on paper.
Amazon has refreshed its Fire HD tablet range, bumping up screen quality, durability, and value for money while still putting the retailer's own services to the fore. Now 7.7mm thin and running the latest Android spin-off, Fire OS 5, the new Fire HD kicks off at under $150, too.
It seems that Amazon is really having some trouble with its consumer devices. While relatively more stable than, say, the Fire Phone, Amazon's Android-based Fire tablets (formerly called "Kindle Fire") aren't exactly the gold mines that its Kindle e-readers are. So what is Amazon's solution? To offer such a tablet at a terribly low price of $50. This would definitely be a cause for concern from some vendors selling devices in that same price range. Ironically, it could also undercut Amazon's own Kindle line, whose cheapest model goes for $79.
It's been a while since we've last seen a mobile device that caters to the very young so it's mildly surprising to see Amazon make such an announcement in the middle of the year. The Fire HD Kids Edition is advertised to be a tablet designed with kids in mind from the ground up, though it's actually a Fire HD 6 just flooded with kid-friendly apps and features. As such, kids will be treated to a "real" Amazon-flavored Android tablet, which means parents can probably use them as well when the little ones are asleep.
The Amazon Fire Phone might be considered a flop, but that doesn't mean the retailer giant is giving up on all its features. One of those features is Firefly, Amazon's rather quirky and amorphous visual search tool. That feature is now arriving on Amazon's more affordable tablet line, the Kindle Fire HD, to give users a bit of an experience of what it feels like to have a digital eye, the Internet, and Amazon's cloud services at your disposal in trying to identify things that you can't.
It's Christmas morning. Your child woke you up with an ear-piercing scream of excitement - Santa has come. Once your child sees the present you've wrapped in special paper - next to the Santa gifts, of course - they snatch it up. They realize it might just be socks. They open it. It's the Amazon Fire HD 6 Kids Edition. They go wild. Then it's your turn. Your task is opening the box and setting the tablet up so that they might play the whole day long. How difficult (or incredibly easy) is this going to be, you might ask?
With the Fire HD 6 we see Amazon approach the standard paperback book size device. But this device is not aimed at reading alone, it’s aimed at every kind of Amazon-based media. It is, after all, an Amazon-centric device, and therefor should be purchased only by those willing to work with Amazon’s collection of digital stores.
Amazon's product lineup expanded quite a bit tonight, with the company rolling out its new Fire HDX 8.9 and its tablet for kids, the aptly named Fire HD Kids Edition. Also set in the company's sights is the budget range, which it has solidly targeted with the new Fire HD 6 and Fire HD 7. The smaller of the two falls into the sub-$100 range, and both offer fairly impressive specs.
Though the Amazon Kindle Fire HD will indeed be bringing a set of specifications here in 2013 that essentially match those of its first edition from 2012, a new aesthetic has hit the holder of the ebooks. What you're getting here is the same 1280 x 800 pixel display with 1.5Ghz dual-core processor under the hood, the same dual-band Wi-fi and Fire OS (upgraded now to 3.0), but put in a package that looks a lot more 2013 in style. And Amazon has beat their best price, kicking this model down to a cool $139 - they've still not hit the $99 they said they'd never hit, but they're close!
