12 ms·

Amazon's New $50 Fire Tablet

35 points by bsilvereagle 11y ago

atomi 11y ago
My Nexus 7 from 3 years ago has better specs and cost only slightly more. Who buys this junk?
- schmichael 11y ago
  The Nexus 7 was 3 times as much. Maybe $100 isn't much to you, but it is to a lot of people.
- EA 11y ago
  Parents. It comes with a two-year "no questions asked" warranty and free access to tons of media curated by an independent third party.
  - Osiris 11y ago
    Actually, the "no questions asked" warranty is only on the "Kids edition" which is $100. The Kids edition is the $50 tablet + a case + "FreeTime", and the 2 year replacement warranty.
    - jay_kyburz 11y ago
      I don't want my kids bombarded with ads for crap on Amazon.
      - Turing_Machine 11y ago
        Then you can pay an extra $15 and get one that doesn't bombard your kids with ads for crap on Amazon.
    - Zelphyr 11y ago
      Where do I find more info about that? I tried returning it and they said I was past the 90-day return policy.
- noja 11y ago
  Your Nexus 7 did not cost 50 bucks three years ago. (Also it's hardly junk because you don't like the price)
- fweespeech 11y ago
  People who are not technically literate and bought into the Amazon eco system. Also Hearthstone players where, with the right combination of events, you can buy in-game currency at a discount that likely exceeds the $50 [if you buy $500 worth of in game currency, which is not unusual in a TCG, you only need a 10% discount to effectively get a "free" tablet] http://hearthstoneplayers.com/today-only-special-bonus-on-amazon-coins-on-top-of-existing-promo/ http://hearthstoneplayers.com/today-only-special-bonus-on-am... [40% discount, spend $200 and end up with a free tablet]
  - scrollaway 11y ago
    Re Hearthstone: This is something that applies to any user of the Amazon store, which is open to regular android users. I doubt Amazon's target demographic for this tablet is "Hearthstone players"... at least, not for that reason.
    - fweespeech 11y ago
      Yeah but I can't think of anything on Amazon worth $200 of Amazon coins besides that.
- leesalminen 11y ago
  My customers use cheap Fire tablets as e-signature collection devices.
  - noja 11y ago
    Which software do they use to collect the signatures? Is it in the app store? With the Amazon Android?
    - leesalminen 11y ago
      Part of my product is a browser based e-signature collection tool using <canvas>, React.js and web sockets. So, not Android related. Any capacitive touch device with a browser and internet works. It's fairly domain specific today (credit card transactions and legal agreements), but as a weekend project I want to abstract it for broader use cases.
- IkmoIkmo 11y ago
  Your Nexus 7 cost (more than) 4x as much when it was introduced, no comparison. Further, there's probably a market for people who want simple devices laying around at their bedside, couch or table that's bigger than their phone, more functional than an e-reader but not as clunky as a laptop (still very much a form factor for desks) for doing light digital stuff like reading the news, e-reader, checking email, browsing the web, watching video etc. None of this really requires high-end specs. This is exactly what I bought the Nexus 7 for (intro'd at $200 for the 7 and $230 for the 7 2nd gen), for my girlfriend, and she hasn't run a single app yet in the last 2 years that'd have required more specs than this tablet. The only thing she might miss is the N7's beautiful screen compared to the 170 PPI Fire tablet, but after buying a MBA a few weeks ago she still hasn't noticed the 128 PPI yet despite me pointing it out to here a few times and she's super happy so even here I think the Fire tablet would've more than sufficed for her use. Granted with 5 inch phones becoming the norm the 7 inch form factor is being squeezed a bit, but at $50 it's still a very interesting little consumption device to have laying around. It's not for me but I've got several family members for whom it's pretty good value.
borkabrak 11y ago
Maybe I'm not sufficiently hardware-savvy, but what's the downside here? I am more or less in the market for a modest tablet, but I'm indifferent to whether it comes from Amazon. Can someone recommend a better deal?
- ninjakeyboard 11y ago
  Likely it's heavily subsidized vs market value in order to increase initial buy with the hope you will purchase from the marketplace. If you want an ereader get a paperwhite imo. But if you actually want a screen tablet this may not be a bad bet. There are lots of good cheap android devices these days too. Fire does run android but in my dev shop we treat fire with special care due to both the heavy modification and different store. It's not a pure android device so you're going to be very much locked in to the amazon market.
  - eclipxe 11y ago
    The new FireOS seems to be much closer to stock Android
- tlianza 11y ago
  Biggest downside is the FireOS, Amazon store instead of Google Play, etc. If you want to do basic web surfing stuff, this is a phenomenal deal. I doubt you'll find a better one. If you want to experience all that modern Android tablets are capable of, these tablets will not provide that. In particular anything related to Google services (mail/apps) and Android apps that are delivered through the Google Play store but not delivered though the Amazon store. There are a lot of mainstream apps that don't bother to push their apps to Amazon's store.
  - 300zxkyle 11y ago
    Excuse my ignorance, what prevents a savvy user from flashing it with a different OS?
    - 11y ago
isaacagh 11y ago
Does anyone knows if this comes with a Snapdragon CPU?
- rasz_pl 11y ago
  most likely mediatek or maybe even allwinner
  - Splines 11y ago
    mediatek: http://bgr.com/2015/09/16/amazon-tablet-specs-50-dollars/ http://bgr.com/2015/09/16/amazon-tablet-specs-50-dollars/
protomyth 11y ago
Mono speaker? I guess they expect everyone to use headphones.
- ceejayoz 11y ago
  No, they expect anyone who cares to pay more than $50.
  - protomyth 11y ago
    If your saying its "built for entertainment", a mono speaker doesn't go with that.
    - semi-extrinsic 11y ago
      You're not going to get any sort of audio fidelity from the speakers in a tablet, so anyone who wants that is already using headphones. Thus it's likely that the people using that speakers can't hear the difference between mono/stereo for the content they care about.
      - Turing_Machine 11y ago
        Exactly. Even on the higher-end iPads the built-in speakers are pretty much crap for any kind of serious listening. Not to mention that the stereo separation you're going to get on a 7" tablet is going to be minimal anyway.
        protomyth 11y ago
        There's a difference between "serious listening" and having left and right channels in a tablet. A person can tell left and right on a 7" device held as close as a tablet. Audio clues matter.
thecrumb 11y ago
Wonder if you could root this and install Cyanogen or something?
- dharma1 11y ago
  i guess if it's a standard chipset and unlocked bootloader, give it a couple of months. You can get a decent tablet for not very much more though
ausjke 11y ago
looks great, if it supports touch-pen it will be perfect for school kids.
- Turing_Machine 11y ago
  Indeed. You'd feel a lot better about turning a little kid loose with a $50 Fire tablet than a $500 iPad.
zkhalique 11y ago
I like how it puts ads on the lock screen to offset costs
toxican 11y ago
Interesting. Very tempting as-is, but we'll have to see where we're at with Cyanogen Mod support in a few months before I'll buy one. Though I realize I'm not the target demographic for this by any means.
webwanderings 11y ago
Never going to buy a 7" no matter how cheap it gets. The screen resolution is not worth it.
- webwanderings 11y ago
  Don't just down-vote dammit, give me an argument if you care so much to click. The people are being hoodwinked into buying these so-called "tablets" of smaller sizes, where as, none of these should be called tablets, rather, they are just a bigger size phones with no traditional calling features. Amazon or no Amazon, you would be wasting your time, energy and $$ if you buy a tablet with anything less than 1024x768 resolution. Just don't.
byron_fast 11y ago
It would be more interesting if Amazon put Flash on it instead of making it a spam delivery device. Swim upstream. Less work than Amazon Underground, more free games.
- sn0v 11y ago
  You're kidding, right? Flash is dying tech, and not worth the battery life tradeoff (which this device doesn't have much of to begin with)
- Splines 11y ago
  AFAIK Adobe stopped supporting flash on Android some time ago. It would be a considerable engineering effort to get it working again. Plus, (again, AFAIK) flash it not common among touch devices and I would be surprised if all games would work easily without a mouse. That aside, what if Amazon got it working? What then? Free content doesn't help Amazon any. The Fire tablets are not just about games/apps - it's about tying the user into the rest of Amazon's media ecosystem. Video, books and shopping. It's Amazon's equivalent of free parking.
  - byron_fast 11y ago
    If free content doesn't help, why spend time on Amazon Underground? My point is: do something different. A low-rent imitation of everything else has so far cost them a fortune. The original Fire had a Flash plugin. I'm sure they could get it working for the cost of about 12 minutes of Prime losses.
    - Splines 11y ago
      To clarify - free content not on Amazon doesn't help Amazon any. Getting more people on Amazon Underground is absolutely helpful. It increases customer mindshare of Amazon apps, increases lock-in and increases the cost of moving over to the Play Store with a different device. This translates into more usage of the Fire devices, which funnels users into shopping more on Amazon.com. Getting flash working (and working well) would be great for customers. Just not for Amazon.
dacox 11y ago
Amazon! Won't ship to lonely old Canada.
- quinndupont 11y ago
  Can anyone else confirm? Seems to have added to my basket (on Amazon.com, but with Canadian account). Now, with a $.70CAD->USD conversion...
Ethan_Mick 11y ago
What does this mean for Amazon's Fire HD 6" Tablet[0]? Looking it now, the new Fire tablet is about the same in every way (screen resolution lacking), but at $50 more, I'm not sure the better screen resolution will win many people over. The new Fire Tablet even has features the 6" one is missing! Mayday and an SD card slot. [0] - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KC6I06S/ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KC6I06S/
deng 11y ago
Before people buy stuff like this and expect to be able to install Cyanogen in a few months: http://forum.xda-developers.com/fire-hd/general/psa-dont-buy-one-cheap-tablet-expect-t2890763 http://forum.xda-developers.com/fire-hd/general/psa-dont-buy...
Zelphyr 11y ago
Everything Amazon does with the Fire product line I find to be terrible. The Kindle Paperwhite is a delight to use but the Fire is beyond frustrating and, often as not, feels like a device designed for the sole purpose of parting me with my money on Amazon other products. My 7 year old got a Kids Kindle Fire. I have 20+ years software engineering experience yet I have more trouble trying to do the most basic things with that device. Its infuriating. We got the Fire TV Stick figuring it would be a good alternative to the Roku. Its not. Most of the time it couldn't keep a connection to wifi. I don't know what Amazon is thinking but, in my opinion, their reputation is suffering badly because of their handling of the Fire product line. I know personally I will never buy another Fire product.
- ktsmith 11y ago
  I've got a kids kindle fire with their free time service for my 6 year old and couldn't agree more. The software and ui are terrible. Worse in some cases than their older fire devices. My son was trying to install a couple of apps yesterday and the progress bar got to 100% and then stalled. The little X on the icons to cancel the process didn't work and a reboot didn't help. The apps weren't in the list of installed apps or anywhere else. I ended up having to block them from his profile and then unblock them before they would reset in the UI. Then we downloaded them one at a time which seemed to work. I spent a good 20 minutes trying to find a way to do this. This is just one small example of the frustrations we've had with the device and all of them stem from the poor user experience and confusing choices they've made. I'm also not impressed with the fire sticks. I don't own any myself but a friend bought four on a whim. He's called me at least a dozen times asking for help with figuring out why they've mysteriously stopped working. It's usually just that the wifi has dropped which happens all the time. Other times it's because his DSL from AT&T is terrible and has reset while he was streaming something and then the device is apparently locked out of any Amazon content most likely due to copyright protection restrictions but the error is just "Video player error this content is currently unavailable." If he swaps devices he can pick up where he left off but that one device is locked out of everything from Amazon for an unknown amount of time while other apps work perfectly. I like AWS but most of their hardware and other software is terrible.
- calm_245 11y ago
ja27 11y ago
Amazon quietly does pretty good business with some school districts. We've made several 1,000+ unit bulk sales of educational apps through them. It's not iPad numbers, but it's a lot better than we thought. This device will slip perfectly into that role.
Mithaldu 11y ago
I'm unsure about the hardware capabilities of this. I understand that the display cannot display 1080p. However, if i do copy a 1080p mp4 file with subtitles onto it, is it likely that this one will be able to play it?
kyriakos 11y ago
You can find Chinese tablets for a similar price with better specs and cleaner/closer to stock android rom with Google services. If your plan is to get this in order to try and flash cyanogen or something similar then you won't mind the dodgy Chinese warranty.
pavornyoh 11y ago
With all the things on the market, why is Amazon doing this? 50 bucks? I am really trying to understand why..

35 points by bsilvereagle 11y ago

atomi 11y ago

My Nexus 7 from 3 years ago has better specs and cost only slightly more. Who buys this junk?

schmichael 11y ago
The Nexus 7 was 3 times as much. Maybe $100 isn't much to you, but it is to a lot of people.
EA 11y ago
Parents. It comes with a two-year "no questions asked" warranty and free access to tons of media curated by an independent third party.
- Osiris 11y ago
  Actually, the "no questions asked" warranty is only on the "Kids edition" which is $100. The Kids edition is the $50 tablet + a case + "FreeTime", and the 2 year replacement warranty.
  - jay_kyburz 11y ago
    I don't want my kids bombarded with ads for crap on Amazon.
    - Turing_Machine 11y ago
      Then you can pay an extra $15 and get one that doesn't bombard your kids with ads for crap on Amazon.
  - Zelphyr 11y ago
    Where do I find more info about that? I tried returning it and they said I was past the 90-day return policy.
noja 11y ago
Your Nexus 7 did not cost 50 bucks three years ago. (Also it's hardly junk because you don't like the price)
fweespeech 11y ago
People who are not technically literate and bought into the Amazon eco system. Also Hearthstone players where, with the right combination of events, you can buy in-game currency at a discount that likely exceeds the $50 [if you buy $500 worth of in game currency, which is not unusual in a TCG, you only need a 10% discount to effectively get a "free" tablet] http://hearthstoneplayers.com/today-only-special-bonus-on-amazon-coins-on-top-of-existing-promo/ http://hearthstoneplayers.com/today-only-special-bonus-on-am... [40% discount, spend $200 and end up with a free tablet]
- scrollaway 11y ago
  Re Hearthstone: This is something that applies to any user of the Amazon store, which is open to regular android users. I doubt Amazon's target demographic for this tablet is "Hearthstone players"... at least, not for that reason.
  - fweespeech 11y ago
    Yeah but I can't think of anything on Amazon worth $200 of Amazon coins besides that.
leesalminen 11y ago
My customers use cheap Fire tablets as e-signature collection devices.
- noja 11y ago
  Which software do they use to collect the signatures? Is it in the app store? With the Amazon Android?
  - leesalminen 11y ago
    Part of my product is a browser based e-signature collection tool using <canvas>, React.js and web sockets. So, not Android related. Any capacitive touch device with a browser and internet works. It's fairly domain specific today (credit card transactions and legal agreements), but as a weekend project I want to abstract it for broader use cases.
IkmoIkmo 11y ago
Your Nexus 7 cost (more than) 4x as much when it was introduced, no comparison. Further, there's probably a market for people who want simple devices laying around at their bedside, couch or table that's bigger than their phone, more functional than an e-reader but not as clunky as a laptop (still very much a form factor for desks) for doing light digital stuff like reading the news, e-reader, checking email, browsing the web, watching video etc. None of this really requires high-end specs. This is exactly what I bought the Nexus 7 for (intro'd at $200 for the 7 and $230 for the 7 2nd gen), for my girlfriend, and she hasn't run a single app yet in the last 2 years that'd have required more specs than this tablet. The only thing she might miss is the N7's beautiful screen compared to the 170 PPI Fire tablet, but after buying a MBA a few weeks ago she still hasn't noticed the 128 PPI yet despite me pointing it out to here a few times and she's super happy so even here I think the Fire tablet would've more than sufficed for her use. Granted with 5 inch phones becoming the norm the 7 inch form factor is being squeezed a bit, but at $50 it's still a very interesting little consumption device to have laying around. It's not for me but I've got several family members for whom it's pretty good value.

borkabrak 11y ago

Maybe I'm not sufficiently hardware-savvy, but what's the downside here? I am more or less in the market for a modest tablet, but I'm indifferent to whether it comes from Amazon. Can someone recommend a better deal?

ninjakeyboard 11y ago
Likely it's heavily subsidized vs market value in order to increase initial buy with the hope you will purchase from the marketplace. If you want an ereader get a paperwhite imo. But if you actually want a screen tablet this may not be a bad bet. There are lots of good cheap android devices these days too. Fire does run android but in my dev shop we treat fire with special care due to both the heavy modification and different store. It's not a pure android device so you're going to be very much locked in to the amazon market.
- eclipxe 11y ago
  The new FireOS seems to be much closer to stock Android
tlianza 11y ago
Biggest downside is the FireOS, Amazon store instead of Google Play, etc. If you want to do basic web surfing stuff, this is a phenomenal deal. I doubt you'll find a better one. If you want to experience all that modern Android tablets are capable of, these tablets will not provide that. In particular anything related to Google services (mail/apps) and Android apps that are delivered through the Google Play store but not delivered though the Amazon store. There are a lot of mainstream apps that don't bother to push their apps to Amazon's store.
- 300zxkyle 11y ago
  Excuse my ignorance, what prevents a savvy user from flashing it with a different OS?
  - 11y ago

isaacagh 11y ago

Does anyone knows if this comes with a Snapdragon CPU?

rasz_pl 11y ago
most likely mediatek or maybe even allwinner
- Splines 11y ago
  mediatek: http://bgr.com/2015/09/16/amazon-tablet-specs-50-dollars/ http://bgr.com/2015/09/16/amazon-tablet-specs-50-dollars/

protomyth 11y ago

Mono speaker? I guess they expect everyone to use headphones.

ceejayoz 11y ago
No, they expect anyone who cares to pay more than $50.
- protomyth 11y ago
  If your saying its "built for entertainment", a mono speaker doesn't go with that.
  - semi-extrinsic 11y ago
    You're not going to get any sort of audio fidelity from the speakers in a tablet, so anyone who wants that is already using headphones. Thus it's likely that the people using that speakers can't hear the difference between mono/stereo for the content they care about.
    - Turing_Machine 11y ago
      Exactly. Even on the higher-end iPads the built-in speakers are pretty much crap for any kind of serious listening. Not to mention that the stereo separation you're going to get on a 7" tablet is going to be minimal anyway.
      - protomyth 11y ago
        There's a difference between "serious listening" and having left and right channels in a tablet. A person can tell left and right on a 7" device held as close as a tablet. Audio clues matter.

thecrumb 11y ago

Wonder if you could root this and install Cyanogen or something?

dharma1 11y ago
i guess if it's a standard chipset and unlocked bootloader, give it a couple of months. You can get a decent tablet for not very much more though

ausjke 11y ago

looks great, if it supports touch-pen it will be perfect for school kids.

Turing_Machine 11y ago
Indeed. You'd feel a lot better about turning a little kid loose with a $50 Fire tablet than a $500 iPad.

zkhalique 11y ago

I like how it puts ads on the lock screen to offset costs

toxican 11y ago

Interesting. Very tempting as-is, but we'll have to see where we're at with Cyanogen Mod support in a few months before I'll buy one. Though I realize I'm not the target demographic for this by any means.

webwanderings 11y ago

Never going to buy a 7" no matter how cheap it gets. The screen resolution is not worth it.

webwanderings 11y ago
Don't just down-vote dammit, give me an argument if you care so much to click. The people are being hoodwinked into buying these so-called "tablets" of smaller sizes, where as, none of these should be called tablets, rather, they are just a bigger size phones with no traditional calling features. Amazon or no Amazon, you would be wasting your time, energy and $$ if you buy a tablet with anything less than 1024x768 resolution. Just don't.

byron_fast 11y ago

It would be more interesting if Amazon put Flash on it instead of making it a spam delivery device. Swim upstream. Less work than Amazon Underground, more free games.

sn0v 11y ago
You're kidding, right? Flash is dying tech, and not worth the battery life tradeoff (which this device doesn't have much of to begin with)
Splines 11y ago
AFAIK Adobe stopped supporting flash on Android some time ago. It would be a considerable engineering effort to get it working again. Plus, (again, AFAIK) flash it not common among touch devices and I would be surprised if all games would work easily without a mouse. That aside, what if Amazon got it working? What then? Free content doesn't help Amazon any. The Fire tablets are not just about games/apps - it's about tying the user into the rest of Amazon's media ecosystem. Video, books and shopping. It's Amazon's equivalent of free parking.
- byron_fast 11y ago
  If free content doesn't help, why spend time on Amazon Underground? My point is: do something different. A low-rent imitation of everything else has so far cost them a fortune. The original Fire had a Flash plugin. I'm sure they could get it working for the cost of about 12 minutes of Prime losses.
  - Splines 11y ago
    To clarify - free content not on Amazon doesn't help Amazon any. Getting more people on Amazon Underground is absolutely helpful. It increases customer mindshare of Amazon apps, increases lock-in and increases the cost of moving over to the Play Store with a different device. This translates into more usage of the Fire devices, which funnels users into shopping more on Amazon.com. Getting flash working (and working well) would be great for customers. Just not for Amazon.

dacox 11y ago

Amazon! Won't ship to lonely old Canada.

quinndupont 11y ago
Can anyone else confirm? Seems to have added to my basket (on Amazon.com, but with Canadian account). Now, with a $.70CAD->USD conversion...

Ethan_Mick 11y ago

What does this mean for Amazon's Fire HD 6" Tablet[0]? Looking it now, the new Fire tablet is about the same in every way (screen resolution lacking), but at $50 more, I'm not sure the better screen resolution will win many people over. The new Fire Tablet even has features the 6" one is missing! Mayday and an SD card slot. [0] - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KC6I06S/ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KC6I06S/

deng 11y ago

Before people buy stuff like this and expect to be able to install Cyanogen in a few months: http://forum.xda-developers.com/fire-hd/general/psa-dont-buy-one-cheap-tablet-expect-t2890763 http://forum.xda-developers.com/fire-hd/general/psa-dont-buy...

Zelphyr 11y ago

Everything Amazon does with the Fire product line I find to be terrible. The Kindle Paperwhite is a delight to use but the Fire is beyond frustrating and, often as not, feels like a device designed for the sole purpose of parting me with my money on Amazon other products. My 7 year old got a Kids Kindle Fire. I have 20+ years software engineering experience yet I have more trouble trying to do the most basic things with that device. Its infuriating. We got the Fire TV Stick figuring it would be a good alternative to the Roku. Its not. Most of the time it couldn't keep a connection to wifi. I don't know what Amazon is thinking but, in my opinion, their reputation is suffering badly because of their handling of the Fire product line. I know personally I will never buy another Fire product.

ktsmith 11y ago
I've got a kids kindle fire with their free time service for my 6 year old and couldn't agree more. The software and ui are terrible. Worse in some cases than their older fire devices. My son was trying to install a couple of apps yesterday and the progress bar got to 100% and then stalled. The little X on the icons to cancel the process didn't work and a reboot didn't help. The apps weren't in the list of installed apps or anywhere else. I ended up having to block them from his profile and then unblock them before they would reset in the UI. Then we downloaded them one at a time which seemed to work. I spent a good 20 minutes trying to find a way to do this. This is just one small example of the frustrations we've had with the device and all of them stem from the poor user experience and confusing choices they've made. I'm also not impressed with the fire sticks. I don't own any myself but a friend bought four on a whim. He's called me at least a dozen times asking for help with figuring out why they've mysteriously stopped working. It's usually just that the wifi has dropped which happens all the time. Other times it's because his DSL from AT&T is terrible and has reset while he was streaming something and then the device is apparently locked out of any Amazon content most likely due to copyright protection restrictions but the error is just "Video player error this content is currently unavailable." If he swaps devices he can pick up where he left off but that one device is locked out of everything from Amazon for an unknown amount of time while other apps work perfectly. I like AWS but most of their hardware and other software is terrible.
calm_245 11y ago

ja27 11y ago

Amazon quietly does pretty good business with some school districts. We've made several 1,000+ unit bulk sales of educational apps through them. It's not iPad numbers, but it's a lot better than we thought. This device will slip perfectly into that role.

Mithaldu 11y ago

I'm unsure about the hardware capabilities of this. I understand that the display cannot display 1080p. However, if i do copy a 1080p mp4 file with subtitles onto it, is it likely that this one will be able to play it?

kyriakos 11y ago

You can find Chinese tablets for a similar price with better specs and cleaner/closer to stock android rom with Google services. If your plan is to get this in order to try and flash cyanogen or something similar then you won't mind the dodgy Chinese warranty.

pavornyoh 11y ago

With all the things on the market, why is Amazon doing this? 50 bucks? I am really trying to understand why..