Fire HD 7th Generation 2017 Version

[enthuz]

With Amazon releasing the 7th Gen Fire HD's 7", 8" and 10" variants, who is looking to pick one up? This one is supposed to be better and faster, so it's much better than the TF201 I'm replacing.

I'm new to this family of tablets. I wanted one as a kitchen tablet for my smart appliances and cooking mostly. The wife and I will have separate accounts on it for our Kindle library of cookbooks...she has her Surface for other needs. I've read that you can load Play Store on the Fire HD easily, so I was sold. I placed my preorder for the 10" 64 GB model.

Please share your thoughts on the new models. I should have mine in hand on 10/11.

 

[anon(238680)]

Although I do lots of business with Amazon, have a Fire TV and Fire Stick, I see no reason to be locked into them for a tablet. I get more than enough "help" from them just having their app on my phone

 

[blak8830]

Bought my wife a 7th gen HD 8 so she could use it to watch downloaded videos where we have no Internet, then picked one up for myself so I could answer her questions more easily. She's also using it to listen to audiobooks, and seems quite pleased. The sound quality is really good, and it's (moslly) taken the place of my 2012 Nexus 7 for reading kindle books, just because of the slightly larger screen. Was very easy to load the play store, following instructions found by searching with Google.

 

[natehoy]

I currently have a Nexus 10 that I use as my tablet daily driver, but the battery dies off at 80% and a new battery is about $50. I'm waiting to see if the new 10" Fire tablet at $150 is as hackable as the 7" Fire Tablets I bought some friends as Christmas presents and was able to put the Play Store on with a simple script. If it is, I will be sorely tempted.

I really want a good 10" tablet with a Wacom (S-Pen style) pen, but even the older Tab "A" is $300, and I'm not sure I want it that "really".

 

[enthuz]

Received my Fire HD 10 (2017). This thing is zippy. I installed play store and other apps with no issues. I then updated it to Fire OS 5.5.0.0. Hands free Alexa is awesome! So far I'm very pleased.

 

[Drtcom]

blak8830

I am a Fire newbie and purchased both the 8 and 7, Could you please tell me how you project it to the tv? I don't know about play store so if you could tell me how it works I'd appreciate it and would not have to keep buying useless hardware

 

[Athlon646464]

@Drtcom:

Can't help you until you share more information about your setup.

Do you have a Smart TV?
If so, does it have any apps built in for casting to it?
Do you have an external device connected to your TV that you can cast to?
Do you already cast using another device you own?

I can cast to my TV a few different ways. My Smart LG TV has a casting app built in, the Roku I have connected to my TV can be used, and the Chromecast I have connected to it can also be used.

I use the Chromecast because it seems to be the easiest method for me. I have the Chromecast app on my tablet which allows me to cast most anything to my Chrome-cast connected to my TV.

 

[Hobo Wrath]

Those of you who have the new 10", do you think it's worth the extra price over the 8"? And is it much faster than last year's models?

I already have last year's 8" and an looking to purchase a second one for family use.

 

[daffy_duck_nj]

If you haven't decided yet, yes, get the HD 10. I bought one to use as a daily tablet. I've done the work needed to add Google Play, and use a different launcher, though the stock fire one isn't bad. (I prefer Nova Launcher.)

Great upgrade hardware wise from my older Samsung tab 4 7 inch, and an Acer Iconia One 10 <--- completely rebuilt that one into a media device, mostly for e-books and less demanding games. I read in some places that a fire device or two have been upgraded to fire 6, which has a Nougat base. Hopefully that will come soon enough to the newer fire tablets. I haven't had much trouble running newer apps, and for those I can't load from Google or amazon, it's just a sideload away from APKmirror.