10 reasons I'm glad I didn't settle for a Kindle Fire

That's a little inflammatory, I know. Lots of people have Kindle Fires, and love them dearly. I know I feel the same way about my Kindle 2. But every device has good and bad points about them, and each one should be evaluated for what the individual needs and will use it for. I know several people with Kindle Fires, of various technological abilities. Some ordered them the first day they were available. Others got them as gifts. Some ordered them without really looking at the requirements first. I've played with three different Fires hands-on, briefly, but even before it came out I determined that they would not fit my needs and instead pursued (and finally, with my tax return,) got a T-Mobile SpringBoard, which is also a 7" tablet, is overall more expensive, although I put up less money up front than a Fire, but in my opinion, the extras were worth it. So here are the things I don't like about the Fire, with the caveat that I am comparing it to what I eventually went with.

1. Wi-fi: The Kindle Fire is wi-fi dependent. Sure you can download material, watch movies, do cloud browsing--but only in a wi-fi network. I am almost never in one, except at the public library (and then I'm usually looking for books). We have a public one at work, but we're not supposed to use it. I don't have a wi-fi network at home. I've had trouble troubleshooting Fires because there was no way to access, say, a video to see if the volume was really okay without going onto a network. One person I know ordered the Fire without realising this, and had to actually go set up a wi-fi network (or rather, have a family member do it) after she got it. Granted, I pay $20 a month for 4G connectivity, but I can check my e-mail on the bus, look up odd medical terms for a friend while he's on his computer, watch a movie via Netflix at my grandmother's which has no computer, that sort of thing. It was the number one reason I decided the Fire was not for me.
   
2. The button to turn the thing on and off is on the bottom of the device. This means that when I've been holding it against me, I've inadvertently turned it off or made it sleep. Mine's on the side in portrait view, which turns out to be the top if you turn it in landscape.
   
3. The earphone jack is also on the bottom. To be honest yesterday when I was doing the troubleshooting, I wasn't sure whether the jack was an earphone or power switch, and had to look it up in the guide. Many tablets do not charge through a USB cord like a phone, and mine is no exception. The Kindle Fire is. That's not bad, that means you just need a cable and not a charger with you if you'll be around computers, but I wanted to make sure I didn't poke the earphones into the wrong jack, and I didn't like the placement in terms of listening if you're holding it portrait up.
   
4. The carousel: I don't care for it. Give me my five Android screens with widgets and icons that I can instantly go to wherever I want rather than scrolling through whatever the most recent stuff is. This is actually something I dislike about the regular Kindle. I'd rather put my categories in order alphabetically rather than most recent first, and there's no option for that.
   
5. No text-to-speech ability. I use this feature all the time on my Kindle 2, and it's sad that it's not available. It also means the device is less accessible to those with visual issues.
   
6. No camera: I have two cameras, a front-facing one and one on the back. That means if I wanted I could Skype or videochat, which I don't really do since I have no one to do it with. But I can scan information into applications like Google Goggles, and most importantly, I can catalogue my books through the LibraryThing scanner application, something I'm using at work and at home. Yesterday I catalogued 45 books alone, as opposed to doing about that many in a good two-week period.
   
7. Its thickness. The Fire is a thick little tablet, and well, seems a little clunky next to mine, which is slimmer and just a little bigger in the rest of the dimensions. But that's solely aesthetics.
   
8. The lack of customisation. The Fire pretty much looks the same except for the cases regardless of who has it. Oh, the content is different (and I'm learning you can tell a lot from a person by what they have on their Kindle), but the look is pretty much the same carousel. I have five home screens to change wallpapers, icons, widgets, whatever I need, and maybe this is something I just haven't played with enough and I'll get a bunch of comments about how you can put a live wallpaper on a Fire, but I'd still argue that in terms of sheer ability to customise, regular Android tablets and iPads win.
   
9. Which brings us to--Amazon content. Please realise, I am an Amazon girl. I adore Amazon products and customer service. But I can get an application from Amazon (and you should look into their free application a day feature in their store) or from the Amazon market. Sometimes the market has higher versions of the same programs, but they also have many more applications. I can have Netflix on either device, but to get Amazon videos, you need Prime, at $79 a year, which isn't a bad price and comes with 2-day shipping, but I already spend $8 a month on Netflix, so why should I add it? I agree it's brilliant the way they packaged it for their content, and you can get other stuff on there through applications or transferring files, but is primarily a device to deliver Amazon content, and I feel I have the best of both worlds.
   
10. Reading ease: This is go to apply to any tablet, including my own, and is rather a comparison of backlight vs. the eInk of the regular Kindles. If you're going to primarily play games, music, or videos, the Fire's great (I don't include productivity applications--I use a lot of those on my tablet, but really haven't tested them on the Fire). If you want really just to read--get another Kindle. The eInk is easier on the eyes, although you need a regular light source (no reading in the dark in bed with a regular Kindle). But in general, reading, I think, is a more pleasurable experience on a regular Kindle, and there's that text-to-speech issue.

There you have it. Maybe they'll change some of those in forthcoming iterations. And there's lots of good things about the Fire; you just have to decide if it's right for you. There was a news story about how it topped the list of most unused gifts this past holiday season. Some people aren't prepared for it, or lack simple tech know-how. I will say the Fire requires less than a standard Android tablet, so if you're less geeky, it may be better for you. But there you go.