Fire

My $35 Amazon Fire 7″ tablet arrived in the mail yesterday. It’s a pretty nice little tablet for $35.  (Even at the regular $50 price, it’s a really good deal.)  I bought a $15 32GB MicroSD card with it, and I’m thinking about loading that up with music, and using it primarily as an MP3 player. (My iPhone works perfectly well as an MP3 player, of course, but I’m always running out of room, since I’ve got so many apps and photos and other random stuff on it.)

I imagine that, for many people, it would make a good e-reader, but for me, I’ll stick with my old e-ink Kindle for that. The Fire does have a nice feature that I truly wish iOS devices had: it’s called “Blue Shade,” and it basically does the same thing that f.lux does. It changes the color and adjusts the brightness so that the screen is easier on the eyes. So if I had to choose between reading on the Fire at night, or reading on my iPad, I’d definitely pick the Fire. (Though some apps on iOS do have a useful “night mode” that’s easy on the eyes.)

Meanwhile, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1″ Android tablet that I bought a couple of years ago at Costco is just gathering dust. Since it’s about the same size as the iPad, I really don’t have much use for it. It was useful for learning how to use Android, I guess, but I never really got in the habit of using it for anything in particular. I checked on Gazelle, and it looks like I can sell it to them for $15. Not great, but it’s better than just throwing it out.

I’m hoping that the 7″ Fire might fit into some use cases in between the iPhone and the iPad. Maybe as something to carry around when I need a screen that’s bigger than the iPhone but I don’t want to bring a full-size iPad. It’s small enough to fit into the pocket on my winter jacket, for instance, while the iPad is definitely not pocket-size.

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  1. Pingback: Fire follow-up

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