“The big idea in Amazon’s first smartphone is that you can control the screen just by moving your head. Amazon’s Fire phone promises to draw you into a 3-D world where things happen without a touch,” Geoffrey A. Fowler writes for The Wall Street Journal. “But in reality, the Fire is the grown-up equivalent of a 9-year-old riding a bike with his hands in the air. ‘Look, Ma, no hands!’ It’s a neat gimmick, but it won’t get you very far.”
“The $199 phone is packed with a number of such technological bells and whistles that seem clever, for about a day,” Fowler writes. “In the past five days, I couldn’t once get the Fire’s battery to last to day’s end—a telephonic cardinal sin… In my battery torture test, which involves streaming a video over Wi-Fi with the screen at 50%, the Fire lasted just 6 hours and 40 minutes, 16% less than the Galaxy, and 25% less than the iPhone.”
“The Fire’s rear camera, which includes a lens that’s supposed to stabilize images, is close to, but not better than, the reigning champ iPhone 5S. The Fire takes photos at a higher resolution, but images of night landscapes and dark restaurants lacked the detail and natural color I could pick up with the iPhone,” Fowler writes. “I had the most hope for the Fire’s 3-D-like ‘dynamic perspective’ technology… Soon enough, though, it starts to feel like a gimmick. This flicking and nodding only worked for me only about three-quarters of the time—just ineffective enough to be a deal-breaker. ”
Read more in the full review here.
MacDailyNews Take: Garbage.
Related articles:
Gizmodo reviews Amazon’s Fire Phone: Don’t buy it – July 23, 2014
Why you shouldn’t buy Amazon’s Fire Phone – June 22, 2014
Amazon Fire Phone could add 55% to users’ shopping bills – June 20, 2014
Amazon’s Misfire Phone: How Jeff Bezos failed – June 19, 2014
Amazon’s Fire Phone might be the biggest privacy invasion ever – June 19, 2014
Analyst: No impact to Apple iPhone from Amazon ‘Fire Phone’ – June 19, 2014
Amazon launches shopping machine masquerading as a phone – June 18, 2014
Amazon Fire Phone’s Firefly feature: Apple’s iPhone already has it – June 18, 2014
Amazon shows ‘Fire Phone’ with 4.7-inch 3-D display to court mobile shoppers – June 18, 2014
Analyst: Amazon smartphone no threat to Apple’s iPhone, but Android phone makers beware – June 17, 2014
Based upon several reviews that I have read, it appears that most (if not virtually ALL) people don’t find ~~DyNaMiC pErSpEcTiVe~~ to be as fascinating a feature as Jeffie.
It’s a solution in search of a problem.
It’s a [big] problem without solution.
I doubt that there is any problem where twitching and nodding your head is the solution.
The problem for Apple’s competition is that they NEED to do things that are “gimmicky” (things you can’t do on an iPhone), even if they are things that users would not want to do. Otherwise, why would the customer buy a fake iPhone that costs just as much as a real iPhone?
The secondary problem is time. The competition is always in a hurry, to avoid Apple making their latest product irrelevant (or even more irrelevant) with the next iPhone. The end result is a product that is not well-integrated or tested sufficiently. There is a lack of refinement. You get a “gimmicky mess.”
What? Wait a minute- did that say theniPhone is better in life than an Android? Well, shiver me timbers!
“In the past five days, I couldn’t once get the Fire’s battery to last to day’s end—a telephonic cardinal sin… In my battery torture test, which involves streaming a video over Wi-Fi with the screen at 50%, the Fire lasted just 6 hours and 40 minutes, 16% less than the Galaxy, and 25% less than the iPhone.”
AND that the iPhone’s camera is better than the Galaxy’s more-megapixel camera.
Should’ve stuck to ereaders. I love my Kindle Paperwhite. Everything else they make is worthless when Apple does it better.
Apple should copy the no tangle headphones.
Headphones, once put into a pocket, tie themselves into more knots, tangles and loops than anyone would think possible. It is Newton’s 13th Law of Physics, and I think I heard Neil Degrasse Tyson reference it (or was that Neil Patrick Harris?).
There was a great episode of Portlandia where a couple is looking for gift for some friends. The go to the Knot Store, where you can buy all sorts of mounted, decorative knots. The store owner then takes them into the “back room” where the “good stuff” is. In it, under bell jars, is a wide assortment of iPad/iPhone earbuds in tangled knots. The couple is astonished and ask how they are made. The owner says that his nephew just sticks them in his pocket, and when he pulls them out the knots are ready. I could *SO* identify with that.
To be tested on CNBC’s Fast Money program at 5pm EST. Might be fun – especially if toady Collin Gillis is on.
Demo: “What it will do—if we’re lucky…”
“This may not work…”
Tap…tap…tap…”
“Oops, sorry…” Tap…tap…tap…”
Conclusion: “AT&T only. That’s the ONLY thing that really bothers me.”
Yeah. Right.
Yet more proof that Bezo is Ballmers baldy love child. He impregnated Gates in the student dorm and nine months later Bezo showed up.
Eewwwwwwww, grossss. Yuccchhh…
Wait. Some people call that “gimmicky mess” innovation.
Who is right?
Another Jungle Dance?
🙋🙆〽🐥💁🙅📣
DO THE AMAZON!
🙅🙆📣🐥🙆〽📢
This flicking and nodding only worked for me only about three-quarters of the time…
The less it works, the more you have to DANCE! HUMAN! DANCE! ~(o_O)~
The Petit Mal.
The real question should be, what does the Washington Post think about the Fire phone? Guessing it got rave reviews!