5 ms·
This review mirrors my experience almost exactly. I would also expand it and mention that PDF reading is pretty terrible. I tried the built-in reader and all o
by larsberg 15y ago
This review mirrors my experience almost exactly.
I would also expand it and mention that PDF reading is pretty terrible. I tried the built-in reader and all of the paid applications. Only one of them, ezPDF, was even able to decently render a two-column ACM paper. And that one had page turns only slightly faster than my e-Ink Kindle Keyboard, and the Fire became hand-scorchingly hot after just a few minutes of using it.
He also didn't mention it, but the device doesn't feel very nice in the hand. Despite the presence of a plastic back, they didn't make it "sticky" enough that you could lightly hold it and not worry about it slipping out due to its heavier weight than the e-Ink devices. So, in practice, you have to be just as careful while holding it as you do with the toe-seeking iPad.
The only thing that worked well was the Crunchyroll app, which streamed and displayed asian video content quite handily.
- keidian 15y ago> and the Fire became hand-scorchingly hot after just a few minutes of using it. And the true reason for the name is discovered? :)
- ConstantineXVI 15y agoTested our app on mine; unsurprisingly it identified it's model as "blaze".
- wanorris 15y agoInteresting. I've had good luck with ezPDF on my (mid-2010 single core) phone except for the obvious size limitations. It's definitely the go-to PDF reader on Android. Maybe the ACM papers are just more complicated to display than the PDFs I've been reading? Because I can't imagine how the Fire could be slower than my phone.
- ConstantineXVI 15y agoFWIW, in my experience, PDF seems to be a lost cause in general on any device w/ less than a 10" screen.
- dagw 15y agoI read PDFs on my 7" Nook color (running cyanogenmod) without any real trouble. I switch between aldiko and ezPDF and find that they both work well.
- fpgeek 15y agoHeck, I used to read PDFs on my G1 using Repligo Reader. They have a great mode that squeezes out the vast majority of text and arranges it in a useful, readable form for the current screen.
- ConstantineXVI 15y agoPDFs technically "work" on the Fire (and the Playbook, another 7" I've used recently), the issue is just that of shoving a letter/A4-sized page into half the space. You can scroll and zoom, but it's still nowhere near as comfortable as reading them at their intended size. It'd be nice to have a "smart" PDF reader that can auto-detect columns and such; but it'd never be a replacement for a proper reflowable doc format (such as ePub/mobi)