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Amazon Launches Updated Fire HD 8 Tablet Now With Alexa Voice Services (hothardware.com)
MojoKid writes from a report via HotHardware: For the first time, Amazon's Alexa voice service is headed to a tablet. It's one of the standout features of Amazon's new Fire HD 8, a budget slate built to offer users all-day battery life, faster performance, and double the onboard storage of previous versions Fire HD tablets -- all for a low $90 price tag. The Fire HD 8 tablet's 8-inch HD (1280x800) IPS display is driven by a quad-core 1.3GHz processor and 1.5GB of RAM, and a capacious 4,750 mAh battery that is claimed to deliver up to 12 hours of mixed-use battery life. In addition, Alexa voice services works on the Fire HD 8 just as it does on other supported products, only here the voice assistant is conjured up by long pressing the home button. You can then task Alexa with reading the news, giving weather reports, playing songs, and so forth. The new Fire HD 8 32GB model is available to pre-order now for $90 with special offers (ads) or $105 without.
US customers pay tax in addition to the list price, so they aren't getting these for $90.
Demanding that the UK get preferential treatment by paying the same $90 list price (20% of which will go to taxes, leaving Amazon with a sale price of $75, which is almost certainly a money-losing proposition) shows that you have a shockingly retarded understanding of economics.
US customers pay tax in addition to the list price, so they aren't getting these for $90.
"Residents of certain high-tax US states", you mean.
I pay the price that Amazon posts on their products, no more. Live free or die.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Isn't it a little disingenuous to call a tablet that's only capable of 1280x800 "HD"? The TV people get away with calling low-res 720p televisions "HD"
1280x720 is still higher than what came before it (704x360 NTSC, 704x480 anamorphic NTSC, 704x432 PAL, or 704x576 anamorphic PAL).
It's just that as technology marches on, the definition of "high" changes. It's like "HIGH DEFINITION GRAPHICS" above the cartridge slot on the 1989 Sega Genesis when its VDP was just 240p. The Genesis was higher definition than what came before it: two 320x224 pixel scrolling planes with 100% sprite coverage and 61 of 512 colors, as opposed to one 256x224 pixel scrolling plane with 25% sprite coverage and 25-31 of 52-64 colors on the NES or Master System. In fact, the Genesis had a 480i mode (320x448 pixels) that only Sonic 2 ever really used due to video memory concerns.
much the same way the USB people managed to pull the wool over people's eyes with their "Full Speed" vs "High Speed" nonsense
In USB 1, 12 Mbps was the full speed of the interface. High speed (480 Mbps theoretical, 280 Mbps usable) didn't come until USB 2.
but reality is most people know 1080p as "HD".
The marketing terms to distinguish the two are "basic HD" (720p-class) and "full HD" (1080p).