Snit
2014-04-18 02:39:22 UTC
Spend a couple hours with a Kindle Fire HD today. Someone I know bought it
for a child with poor vision. We were hoping that it would work well for
her. Nope. Some of it is not the fault of the device - she wants to be able
to loan materials from the library and the local library has a poor
selection. Well, that right there is bad - no content reader will be great
if you do not have much content.
But the Fire itself is pretty piss poor. It is made by Amazon and they push
you to it. Want to read ePub. Good luck. Maybe there is an app for that?
Looking on line I found ways to convert to the format it likes. And there is
no content management software for the desktop - at least that comes with
it. Maybe there is something online? The screen is so-so... my iPod Touch is
clearly much better. Oh, and ads. Good grief - you get ads on the start
screen... so much so they obscure the slide-to-unlock feature. Why would
they do that (oh, to make you *have* to look at the ads). Everywhere you go
there are ads.
There was also the oddity that sometimes when it is plugged in it will not
turn on. You have to unplug it (still will not turn on) then plug it back in
again (then it will). And there is no physical home button... and sometimes
no quick way to get to a virtual home button on the screen! That is just
poor design. It has "wizard" things that pop up which are annoying -
supposed to help you figure out how to use the device but the people I was
with just wanted to hit the button they could see but it was "behind" the
not-so-helpful wizard thing.
The child using it was completely unimpressed. So was I. Not sure an iPad
Mini would be better - but that is the next thing to try.
--
* Mint MATE: Trash, Panel, Menu: <http://youtu.be/C0y74FIf7uE>
* Mint KDE bugs or Easter eggs? <http://youtu.be/CU-whJQvtfA>
* Mint KDE working with folders: <http://youtu.be/7C9nvniOoE0>
* Mint KDE creating files: <http://youtu.be/N7-fZJaJUv8>
* Mint KDE help: <http://youtu.be/3ikizUd3sa8>
* Mint KDE general navigation: <http://youtu.be/t9y14yZtQuI>
* Mint / LibreOffice: <http://youtu.be/USU9iqppfto>
* Win 8 / Word 2013: <http://youtu.be/z8gUL2TCcV4>
* Mavericks / Pages 5.1: <http://youtu.be/D3BPWANQoIk>
for a child with poor vision. We were hoping that it would work well for
her. Nope. Some of it is not the fault of the device - she wants to be able
to loan materials from the library and the local library has a poor
selection. Well, that right there is bad - no content reader will be great
if you do not have much content.
But the Fire itself is pretty piss poor. It is made by Amazon and they push
you to it. Want to read ePub. Good luck. Maybe there is an app for that?
Looking on line I found ways to convert to the format it likes. And there is
no content management software for the desktop - at least that comes with
it. Maybe there is something online? The screen is so-so... my iPod Touch is
clearly much better. Oh, and ads. Good grief - you get ads on the start
screen... so much so they obscure the slide-to-unlock feature. Why would
they do that (oh, to make you *have* to look at the ads). Everywhere you go
there are ads.
There was also the oddity that sometimes when it is plugged in it will not
turn on. You have to unplug it (still will not turn on) then plug it back in
again (then it will). And there is no physical home button... and sometimes
no quick way to get to a virtual home button on the screen! That is just
poor design. It has "wizard" things that pop up which are annoying -
supposed to help you figure out how to use the device but the people I was
with just wanted to hit the button they could see but it was "behind" the
not-so-helpful wizard thing.
The child using it was completely unimpressed. So was I. Not sure an iPad
Mini would be better - but that is the next thing to try.
--
* Mint MATE: Trash, Panel, Menu: <http://youtu.be/C0y74FIf7uE>
* Mint KDE bugs or Easter eggs? <http://youtu.be/CU-whJQvtfA>
* Mint KDE working with folders: <http://youtu.be/7C9nvniOoE0>
* Mint KDE creating files: <http://youtu.be/N7-fZJaJUv8>
* Mint KDE help: <http://youtu.be/3ikizUd3sa8>
* Mint KDE general navigation: <http://youtu.be/t9y14yZtQuI>
* Mint / LibreOffice: <http://youtu.be/USU9iqppfto>
* Win 8 / Word 2013: <http://youtu.be/z8gUL2TCcV4>
* Mavericks / Pages 5.1: <http://youtu.be/D3BPWANQoIk>