Kindle Fire vs. iPad

You don’t have to be a tech blog junkie to have been bombarded with the pre-game hype surrounding Amazon’s release of the Kindle Fire this November.  From the sound of things, you’d think the iPad was as dead as the proverbial doornail, but just doesn’t know it yet.

The hype, as usual, doesn’t quite live up to the reality.  Of course, much ado has been made about Kindle’s “killer” price point of $199, and to be sure, if a consumer could purchase a device that does everything the iPad does, but does it for $300 less, switching from one to the other would be a no-brainer.  That said, it’s worth mentioning that much like the gaming industry, which loses a remarkable amount of money on every console sold (and hopes to make up the difference with game sales), it appears as though the Kindle will lost $50 on each Amazon unit sold, which it hopes to recoup in book and media sales through its own store.

More importantly, however, the Kindle Fire does not, in fact, do everything the iPad does.  As Ticonderoga Securities analyst Brian White wrote in a recent letter to his clients, “Our initial take on the Kindle Fire is that the product lacks the enhanced capabilities, aesthetics, power, and rich features found on the iPad2.”  The Kindle Fire requires a wi-fi hub to connect to the internet, it has no camera, and with a much smaller screen than its purported competitor, it won’t have quite the same appeal, or won’t quite appeal to the same consumer base, as the iPad.