When I first heard about the Amazon Kindle Fire, as a fan of Amazon and its earlier Kindle models, I was hopeful. In fact, I put down my $199.00 as soon as the company started taking orders.
Then, it arrived and with a mixture of excitement and anticipation, I opened the box and got my first real look at the Fire. Sadly, my excitement turned to disappointment as I put the Kindle Fire through its paces. Sure, it has some nice features and makes ordering content from Amazon extremely easy, but in many other ways it came up short.
In the end, even at $199.00, I decided it wasn’t for me and sent it back to Amazon for a refund. Apparently, I am not alone as reports have been coming it hat many others have been doing the same thing.
Fortunately for those still using the Fire, Amazon is set to address some of the concerns with an upcoming software update for the Fire. “In less than two weeks, we’re rolling out an over-the-air update to Kindle Fire,” Amazon spokesperson Drew Herdener told The New York Times in a recent interview.
According to Herdener, the update will improve multitouch performance on the device and will also enable a feature that allows users to edit their usage history on the tablet. That’s all well and good but it won’t address the physical problems I had with the device such as the lack of a volume control and the placement of the on/off switch which, it seems, is designed to be in exactly the wrong place no matter how you hold it.
As a fan of Amazon and their earlier Kindle devices, I’m going to keep an eye out for the next version of the Kindle Fire. Maybe 2.0 will be the magic number.
Nick from City of Kik
December 13, 2011 at 11:20 amI’m a huge fan of Amazon’s Kindle too and was thinking of getting the Fire right after Christmas, but now I’m probably going to wait for the next generation which rumor has it might come out in spring. Fingers crossed.