[Marty Chinn]

What a Shock, Marty is being negative in a Kindle thread.

How is that negative? It makes sense for them to clear out existing stock with a new model being rumored for early to mid summer. I don't understand what's negative about suggesting someone might want to wait and see what Amazon has planned.

[bryanee]

Any chance this is going to hit the UK anytime soon? I've looked around but I cant find any info on it.

[SteveWD40]

Any chance this is going to hit the UK anytime soon? I've looked around but I cant find any info on it.

Should be within the month. My GF works in mobile gaming and her company has had a few meetings regarding it of late and they got some test units in so it's got to be imminent.

[VsRobot]

I have ICS on it. Runs awesome.

I read the ICS roms for Fire were pretty poor. Which ROM are you using? Does YouTube HD work? Hulu plus?

[Stat Flow]

I read the ICS roms for Fire were pretty poor. Which ROM are you using? Does YouTube HD work? Hulu plus?

I can't vouch for Hulu plus, but YouTube HD works smoothly.

The reason is because thy recently got hardware acceleration working for the latest ICS roms on the Fire. This translates to a much smoother experience. I tried ICS back in march but had to go back to stock. Went to ICS again yesterday and never looked back. I'm using the gedeROM which is over at XDA.

[fatigues_gasolini]

I bit the bullet on one of these when it was on sale this week. How easy is it to flash to ics?

[Cheebo]

Kindle Fire sales plummeted a lot more than expected in the last quarter to under 750k. Samsung regained their spot as the #2 tablet maker topping Amazon.:
http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS23466712

[planar1280]

Kindle Fire sales plummeted a lot more than expected in the last quarter to under 750k. Samsung regained their spot as the #2 tablet maker topping Amazon: http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS23466712

from 4.8 million in Q1 with a 25% marketplace to 750K with a 4% marketplace. I shall love Amazon's next Q2 results

[Cheebo]

from 4.8 million in Q1 with a 25% marketplace to 750K with a 4% marketplace. I shall love Amazon's next Q2 results

Even with the christmas launch that drop off is far more than was expected by analysts. It's pretty shocking how much it dropped. Samsung and Lenovo held on pretty well from Q1.

[planar1280]

Even with the christmas launch that drop off is far more than was expected by analysts. It's pretty shocking how much it dropped.

Business Insider called it the Fruitcake of the Tablets. A Tablet everyone wants to gift but no one wants to own

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-k...tablets-2012-5

[Cheebo]

I can't think of another post launch drop off this severe, its incredible. Maybe Amazon was better off sticking to e-readers.

86% drop that is just crazy.

[Somnid]

Kindle Fire sales plummeted a lot more than expected in the last quarter to under 750k. Samsung regained their spot as the #2 tablet maker topping Amazon.: http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS23466712

They wouldn't even know what those shipments were because it's primarily sold through Amazon and they don't disclose those things. The only thing they could know is shipments to retailers.

[Cheebo]

They wouldn't even know what those shipments were because it's primarily sold through Amazon and they don't disclose those things. The only thing they could know is shipments to retailers.

The full report factors in Amazon sales. IDC is the industry standard for marketshare/sales of tablets and computers info.

[Bomber Bob]

Please amazon don't kill e-ink

[Cheebo]

Please amazon don't kill e-ink

This probably helps e-ink more than anything, they likely have a near monopoly over the e-ink e-reader market.

[Somnid]

The full report factors in Amazon sales. IDC is the industry standard for marketshare/sales of tablets and computers info.

But how do you compute that? It's like NPD trying to figure out Steam sales. They are the industry standard but there is no method to do it because it's a black box. You'd have to take into account a small set of known app sales from Amazon's market place, browser statistics and try to extrapolate it very hand wavily.

[luoapp]

Business Insider called it the Fruitcake of the Tablets. A Tablet everyone wants to gift but no one wants to own http://www.businessinsider.com/the-k...tablets-2012-5

Cut the weight in half, keep the same performance, drop the price to 100. Now you get a Muffin of the Tablets.

[JGS]

Numbers are not computing to me.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/25461...let_sales.html

Never underestimate the power of a cheap, well-marketed tablet like Amazon's Kindle Fire. According to Comscore, the Kindle Fire accounts for 54.4 percent of Android tablets sold in the United States. No other Android tablet comes close in Comscore's figures. Samsung's entire Galaxy Tab lineup only has 15.4 percent of the Android market. Motorola's Xoom -- the first Android tablet on the market -- has only a 7 percent share. But the numbers are skewed for one big reason: Barnes & Noble's Nook Tablet and Nook Color are omitted from the measurements. Comscore considers those Nooks to be e-readers, not tablets -- even though they run apps, browse the Web, and play music and video on full color displays, just like the Kindle Fire. Barnes & Noble would likely capture a sizable share if its slate was included. Before the Kindle Fire launched last year, the Nook Color was the second best-selling tablet on the market, behind Apple's iPad. In any case, Comscore's numbers confirm what most tech watchers already assumed: Android tablets owe most of their success to the Kindle Fire and presumably the Nook tablets, which use heavily modified versions of open-source Android. Their interfaces are designed around simple media consumption, and their pricing starts at just $200, making them safe, low-budget alternatives to the iPad. A study from January found that Android's tablet share tripled to 39 percent in the fourth quarter, when Amazon and Barnes & Noble launched their tablets. The success of the Kindle Fire and Nook tablets likely vexes Google, because its own app store and content services aren't available on those devices. Google is now trying to bolster its own ecosystem by re-branding it as “Google Play,” and will likely launch its own low-cost, 7-inch tablet this year. That may be Google's best hope at gaining ground, because no Android tablet that's taking on the iPad directly is getting any traction

Granted this is NA vs. the world, but Fire is not showing itself to be a dud just this past week. Amazon is happy as clams with the performance as well so I'm officially skeptical about the "plummeting" stuff.

The Fire just may not be as popular worldwide as it clearly seems to be in the States.

EDIT: This was last week and there were several news artivles pointing to the same thing.

[Xplatformer]

Doesn't seem right that they group the multitude of Android tablet mfgs into one number, yet Apple and Amazon are judge solely as individual devices.


I think any of those Android tablet mfgs would KILL to have Kindle Fire sales numbers for the past quarter.


The hype may have died down, but I still think a majority of cost conscious tablet buyers will heavily consider the Kindle Fire.

Love mine.

[kuroshiki]

Only Windows 8 tablet can save us.

Seriously I don't see the hype for the any tablet product.

[WhatRobEats]

My experience with the Fire has gotten so much better since I got rid of the Amazon interface and went with plain old gingerbread, I haven't really researched much about ICS outside of that one ROM I had a while back it wasn't very stable.

There are probably some much better ROMs for ICS out there now.

[GK86]

I read the ICS roms for Fire were pretty poor. Which ROM are you using? Does YouTube HD work? Hulu plus?

Using this one. Netflix/YT app don't work on it. I barely, if ever, watched Netflix on the fire, so I'm not missing much there. Youtube you could get it through the website.

If you could live without those two(or three, guessing Hulu doesn't work either), then grab it. As Stat Flow mention, I think they fixed it with the GedeROM.

[VsRobot]

I can't vouch for Hulu plus, but YouTube HD works smoothly. The reason is because thy recently got hardware acceleration working for the latest ICS roms on the Fire. This translates to a much smoother experience. I tried ICS back in march but had to go back to stock. Went to ICS again yesterday and never looked back. I'm using the gedeROM which is over at XDA.

Thanks, I flashed that rom on it and am loving it.

Hulu Plus doesn't work, a minor annoyance. Swype doesn't work either, which really sucks. Background audio apps (Acast, Amazon MP3, Audible) crash more often than I'd like. Overall, though, a better experience than CM7 and the stock rom for sure.

[Raistlin]

This probably helps e-ink more than anything, they likely have a near monopoly over the e-ink e-reader market.

last stats I recall were something like mid 20% range for Nook and around 60% for Kindle

[FunnyBunny]

The sales drop off has been massively blown out of proportion. PC World reports the Fire sold just under 2 million in the first quarter.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/25507...roup_says.html

I love my Fire, though I wish the Amazon App Store had a better selection of premium apps. I use Tweetbot and Flipbpard on my iPhone and there is nothing comparable on the Fire.

Pocket, however, is sensational.

[Lasthope106]

I love my Kindle Fire. Having played with an Ipad it really is a different type of device for me. The Ipad is more of a laptop/netbook replacement. The Fire is a different thing that I can't quite describe. It's lighter and smaller, great for surfing the web, watching movies and listening to music in your bed.

[Palmer_v1]

So this last update apparently forced parental controls, which I've never set a password for. Now I can't browse the web on it, and it'll probably prevent me from doing other things as well. The only solution I've seen so far is resetting to factory default which is not acceptable.

[Gattsu25]

So this last update apparently forced parental controls, which I've never set a password for. Now I can't browse the web on it, and it'll probably prevent me from doing other things as well. The only solution I've seen so far is resetting to factory default which is not acceptable.

I never set a password either and it didn't force parental controls on mine. I'm on 6.3.1_user_blahblah

[FunnyBunny]

Flipboard on the Fire is amazing. This device keeps getting better!

[samus4ever]

Welp sold my ancient 4 year old macbook yesterday and ordered a Kindle Fire. Can't wait for Monday. Tried out the demo unit at Target and loved it. Just need something for watching videos and browsing web while I'm on my couch or in bed. Already got a nice desktop and my laptop gets really loud when watching videos and such. Also, this will give me the perfect operotunity to start reading again. Already ordered 4 of those free classics and Hunger Games.

[luoapp]

I have a strange problem with my Fire, and spent 2hour with Amazon CS (3 of them) on the phone with no answer. Hope someone here can help.

The problem is actually straightforward: I can't read books ( or docs ) on Fire. For the Amazon books I bought, I can see them under the "cloud" tab, but can't download. Same as the docs sent through kindle email. For those stored locally, I can't see them under "Books" or "Docs" at all. On "manage your kindle" webpage, I can see the files sent to my kindle Fire are all in the pending query despite it is connected.

I've tried rebooting, resetting to factory settings, de-reg/re-reg. The book formats are txt, pdf, etc.

I only noticed this a couple of days ago, but I suspect it has something to do with Amazon's last update. I've been reading some of the books since I bought the Kindle more than 6mo ago. I can still watch Amazon video, download apps through Amazon store, even change kindle's name from the "manage your kindle" webpage. I just can't read the book. BTW, My other kindle (keyboard) is working just fine.

Any idea?

[pgtl_10]

When was the last Fire update?

I want to add Arabic font to the browser. Is there any to do that?

Is there a gmail app for Kindle?

Also how do I get ESPN radio to work for Kindle? It just won't work:(

[Greyface]

Amazon to Sell Ads on Kindle Fire Welcome Screen

Amazon is pitching ads on the device's welcome screen, according to an executive at an agency that Amazon has pitched... It's unclear whether it is pitching the ad for the current best-selling Kindle Fire or a future ad-supported version of the device, though the price tag would seem high for an ad unit on a device that currently has no distribution. Reuters has reported that Amazon is looking to start shipping a new Kindle Fire model in July... Amazon isn't guaranteeing the number of devices that the welcome-screen ads will reach, telling agencies that it hasn't decided whether the ads will start popping up on devices that have already been purchased or just on new devices... The pricing level is reminiscent of iAD, Apple's ad network that places ads within apps on iPhones and iPads. Apple was asking $1 million-minimum deals when iAd first launched, but over time cut the requested ad spend several times: to $500,000, $300,000 and, finally, to $100,000. Apple also has since simplified its pricing structure. Industry sources speculate that Amazon is attempting to build a competitor to iAD...

[AndyD]

I would buy a SO supported Fire. Just like the SO Kindle. Which has paid for itself many times over.

[Somnid]

Subsidizing device price with ads was one of the smartest things Amazon has done. It's a lot harder with a Fire because it can impact battery but by doing this they could further cut the price and keep it hyper competitive. The way they do ads on Kindle is brilliant, very non-invasive and usually full of stuff that's actually interesting.

[Vyer]

Is there a way to customize what ads you see? I turned it on on my Keyboard because folks in here were saying how interesting they were, but all I saw was crap. Primarily groupon like junk for massages and shit. Turned it back off after a couple of weeks.

[FunnyBunny]

A "Special Offer" Kindle Fire could be a great way to bump the specs while maintaining the $200 price point.

I am very interested to see what Amazon has in store for he Fire line and am actually surprised very little has leaked so far.

[AndyD]

Is there a way to customize what ads you see? I turned it on on my Keyboard because folks in here were saying how interesting they were, but all I saw was crap. Primarily groupon like junk for massages and shit. Turned it back off after a couple of weeks.

Yes. If you logon to your Amazon account, you can go to manage devices, then there is an option regarding the types of ads you see. You can increase/decrease several categories of ads.

My biggest issue is that they are still showing coupons for places that are not where I live. I am not going to get a massage or cupcakes in a place 1000 miles away.

[Dwayne]

Is it still a good time to buy Kindle Fire? I have a friend going to the US for E3 next week, and a budget of $200 or so. Was planning on getting KFire and then installing ICS and using it to read Google Currents and watch the occasional video on the train.

[AndyD]

Depending on your hurry. The Asus tablet is supposed to be roughly or under 200 very soon.

But he could probably get a $140 refurb Fire and even if other stuff comes out, he can recover most of that cost if he resells it used to upgrade.

[SonnyBoy]

hey guys, I'm going to pick up a kindle fire today at 5:30 PM. I found the seller on craigslist and they're selling the device for $140. Do you think that is a fair price?

[nemss]

hey guys, I'm going to pick up a kindle fire today at 5:30 PM. I found the seller on craigslist and they're selling the device for $140. Do you think that is a fair price?

Its the same price as the refurb Kindle Fire would go for, so I think that's fair.

[SonnyBoy]

So I picked up the Fire. It'll suffice for what I'm using it for, which is to hold me down till the next iPad. I purchased an iPad2 for my ff on Xmas, there's no comparison, but neither is the price lol.

Anyway, ive never rooted anything before. Any recommendatikns?

[Dwayne]

Depending on your hurry. The Asus tablet is supposed to be roughly or under 200 very soon.

He's there for E3 week and then comes back, it's for me to use. The other thing is the rumoured iPad Mini could potentially be announced the following week at WWDC.

Edit: Looks like Galaxy Tab 2 is the go.

SonnyBoy: http://www.groovypost.com/howto/flas...4-kindle-fire/

[SonnyBoy]

SonnyBoy: http://www.groovypost.com/howto/flas...4-kindle-fire/

Thanks sir.

[SonnyBoy]

I'm really enjoying this device since putting ICS on it. Sadly no GQ app since removing the original OS.

[SD-Ness]

How do you guys feel about using free books like the stuff from Project Gutenberg, etc.? I'm suspicious of the quality.

[VsRobot]

How do you guys feel about using free books like the stuff from Project Gutenberg, etc.? I'm suspicious of the quality.

They are fine. These days, commercial ebooks have just as any errors as OCRed public domain stuff anyway. Most of the big name guys (Jack London, Edgar Rice Burroughs, et al) have been proofed to near-perfection by now.

[VsRobot]

What is a good blog/RSS feed to follow for CM9 on Fire updates? Would hate to miss out if it gets upgraded.

[Cr0wn0]

What is a good blog/RSS feed to follow for CM9 on Fire updates? Would hate to miss out if it gets upgraded.

I just subscribe to the gederom and hashcode threads on XDA. They seem to be the most active CM9 based roms.