h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Have to say I am very impressed with the new Kindle Fire range.

I actually think that Fire HD 8.9 at a $299 price point could really well be a bona fida iPad competitor. If the build quality is even half ok they will sell a metric shed load of them.

FB

Is this the very latest one? I read that they were about to announce some new Kindles. How's it rate against the Nexus 7?

I was hoping I could talk my friend into buying a Nexus 7 so I could check it out. Instead, she decided it was still too expensive so I sold her my ADAM for $100 (outstanding*). Since she's just planning on using it at work, it should be perfectly adequate for her, especially since I loaded it with the most stable ROM available (a Gingerbread version).








*not as in, "Wow, that's great" but as in, "hey, where's my c-note?"

Don´t ATF get nosey when you´re paid a C-note?

They introduced a new range. Beefed up the original Fire with more ram and a faster processor and released a Fire HD, a Fire HD 8.9 (with 1080p screen) and a Fire HD LTE.

Even the Fire HD 8.9 LTE only comes in at $499, and the wifi only version of that is $250.

On this side of the pond they seem competitively priced too. I think they will sell a lot of Kindles.

FB

My friend has one of the old Kindle Fire models (from a year ago, now it'?S old ) He took me out to lunch and we hit the 'Bux and put it through its paces, comparing it to the claims for the 7" HD version due out next Friday.

While the older one is probably a little heavier than the new ones will be, if the fit/finish is the same, they've got my money --- old version is very impressive, and this is in a public wifi area crowded with folks using the wifi all at the same time. New HD models will have dual wifi antennas, to make them have longer range, less signal drop out.

Only question I have now is will it need to upgrade my home DSL to take full advantage of the HD, which Kindle rates at 31 mps. My download speed is for 1.5 mps. Any of you friendly geeks wants to hazard any guesses?

Watching movies in livestream might be a problem, downloading books rather not.
For reading one needs anyway, so download whilst you put the kettle on.

I am currently surveying the current crop of laptops,
notebooks and tablets because all these new devices
have created a very complex and higher standard of
data streaming that is seeing my old (5 year) laptop
choking and freezing even on Utoobs and BBC news clips.

Task Manager constantly shows my CPU pinging at 100%.

Kid at the computer store just shrugs and says my old
chip can't handle the current state of streaming. We tried
adding a couple more MB of RAM but the problem is the
old CPU not being up to today's standards. (That or
the constant pinging from adbots.)

The refresh/stop icon even on my h2g2 pages is forever
blinking on/off and the activity bar keeps suggesting
it is waiting for 'adplus', 'adfaq' or some other adbot
function to decide who and where I am and what it should
try to sell me. I do have an adblocker and pop-up blocker
running all the time so there's a constant battle going on
behind the scenes using all my CPU capacity.

So my question is what CPU brand or capacity should I be
looking for in any new device.

~jwf~

<

Folks, I only mention freeware here, so this is no advertising, ok?

jwf, your pooter probably does lots of things you´ve never told it to do.

Look for
avast antivirus
Spybot Search & Destroy
Eusing Registry Cleaner

My old wreck still does fine.

Your suggestions sent me on a trip through a variety
of FREE scans and Check-up programs. Some found 65
potential errors and defects and one said 135.

I tried their FREE fix-up (it actually cost $9.95)
It took ten minutes; finally reported successfully
fixing 135 problems. Another says there are still 18.

H2g2 pages are much more stable but nothing has improved
my video streaming of Utoob or BBC news clips. Task manager
still shows CPU peaked at 100% of capacity as video freezes
and starts and freezes and starts.

So I guess I'm still shopping for a good video streaming
machine with some good sound reproduction.

~jwf~

That´s called husband watching football.

You're not alone, jwf...my laptop is a spring chicken (~1 1/2yo) and it does the occasional freeze-and-buffer-shuffle on UToob all the time.

I'm hoping you'll see a continued improvement in the stability of h2g2, I've been doing some serious tinkering and it's currently looking like I've cut the daily errors by three fifths, including the one that made a page seem to be constantly loading.

And we thank you for your efforts, Pastey! I last saw that loading flicker about 10 days ago, hopefully it won't be back. :D

I've been looking at the Amazon apps for the Fire, and I'm hyperventilating over the ones I depend on , on my iPod Touch, that I won't get on the Fire...

The Amazon apps seem to be a seriously closed market place. Part of my day job is building apps for mobile devices, and I couldn't even tell you what platform they use.

The Amazon App store is Android apps, and it is a curated market.

It is very easy to sideload the Google Play apk onto the device and within days there will be custom ROMs on XDA which already include the G-Apps suite on the new Fires

FB

If they're standard Java/Android apps, I'm surprised there aren't more of them. It wouldn't take much (or rather shouldn't) to convert apps over.

They dont require any porting. They are just the exact same Android APKs as from the play store.

The big selling point for Amazon is that:-

a) It is a curated market (let's be honest there is a lot of crap in the Play store.
b) They reckon the normal Amazon "recommendation" system will make it easier for people to find apps they like (and therefore drive more revenue to devs
c) The Free App of the day.

No actual difference in the apps at all though.

FB

The technology may be the same, but I wonder how many of the apps in the play store were designed to be able to be run on larger screens?

They are just the same tablet apps as appear in the Play store. Honestly they are just the same apps, just lots more in the Play store with the occasional Amazon exclusive.

FB