i've had mine for 24 hours now and my review is pretty much the same. too many software quirks make it annoying to use, and the lack of physical hardware buttons may be a fatal flaw. i do like the size of it, and it's easy to hold in one hand. i think the asymmetrical size of the screen bezel is so that it can be held in one hand without having your fingers/palm on the screen, and maybe that is also why there are no backlit-buttons under there like on many android phones.
i have a kindle 3 and bought the kindle fire as a general-use tablet (so no book reading on it) and my first tests were with the netflix and plex apps (plex had to be side-loaded since it is not in amazon's store). amazon's native video app has on-screen volume control, so adjusting it is pretty simple. any other app, however, expects there to be hardware volume buttons so changing the volume in an app like netflix or plex means:
- tapping once to take the video out of nearly-full-screen (every non-amazon app doesn't go full-screen, there is still a small bar at the bottom to bring up the soft back/home buttons)
- tapping again at the top to bring down the quick control panel, which makes netflix and plex pause (probably because they interpret it as another app getting focus)
- changing the volume is done by sliding the control in large steps (there are only like 8 steps for a control that goes across the entire width of the screen), which then plays the system default beep at that volume
- tapping again to focus the netflix app
- then tapping the app's play button to resume playing. since the video was paused, you won't know if the new volume setting is ok until you do all that and resume playing.
the power button being at the bottom makes me think i'm going to accidentally press it when the device is resting on something. the headphone jack there seems to be a poor choice as well. also, the charge led is very bright, so when it's charging on my nightstand, there is a bright orange glow pointing at things.
The web browser is very slow. It's really bad. I try to scroll and sometimes have to really press hard with my fingers to get it to respond. Sometimes no response.
I thought reading a book would be easier. Looking up a word can be hard. Sometimes I hold my finger on a word and a whole line of text is highlighted and thus I can't look up the definition.
Browsing my queue on Netflix is a pain and searching for movies on Prime isn't great either.
Overall, I rate the device 2 stars out of 5. I wish I had not bought it. Wait for version 3!
From what I've read, the power button is on the bottom of all the new Kindles (Touch, Non-Touch, and Fire), so this seems to be a purposeful unifying design scheme.
i have a kindle 3 and bought the kindle fire as a general-use tablet (so no book reading on it) and my first tests were with the netflix and plex apps (plex had to be side-loaded since it is not in amazon's store). amazon's native video app has on-screen volume control, so adjusting it is pretty simple. any other app, however, expects there to be hardware volume buttons so changing the volume in an app like netflix or plex means:
- tapping once to take the video out of nearly-full-screen (every non-amazon app doesn't go full-screen, there is still a small bar at the bottom to bring up the soft back/home buttons)
- tapping again at the top to bring down the quick control panel, which makes netflix and plex pause (probably because they interpret it as another app getting focus)
- changing the volume is done by sliding the control in large steps (there are only like 8 steps for a control that goes across the entire width of the screen), which then plays the system default beep at that volume
- tapping again to focus the netflix app
- then tapping the app's play button to resume playing. since the video was paused, you won't know if the new volume setting is ok until you do all that and resume playing.
the power button being at the bottom makes me think i'm going to accidentally press it when the device is resting on something. the headphone jack there seems to be a poor choice as well. also, the charge led is very bright, so when it's charging on my nightstand, there is a bright orange glow pointing at things.