Definitely need to side load an mp3 player and an ebook app. Video player brings new meaning to rudimentary.
For what it’s worth, Amazon does have its own (more limited) App Store. MX player is one option, and there are others:
http://www.amazon.com/J2-Interactive-MX-Player/dp/B00UXKBKGK/ref=sr_1_1?s=mobile-apps&ie=UTF8&qid=1446403808&sr=1-1&keywords=video+player
You only have to sideload apps that aren’t normally available in Amazon’s own ecosystem, namely Google ones and apps from smaller devs who don’t bother with Fire.
Yeah, I found VLC and Adobe’s reader there. A couple of eBook readers, but the installation instructions are not model current. Me with something new! Uncharted territory.
Need to switch off auto complete.
Took until last night to get an ePub reader to work that did not require one to be linked to the net. Now I have three running. How do you close an app? Never mind, I think I found it a few days ago and will find it again. Rummaging around the system I was reminded that Android is based on Linux. Knew there was something I hated about it. Online stories made it look like “sideloading” is some arcane and difficult process; it’s like they had never installed software on their desktops that wasn’t on an autorun CD. The video, but not audio, in the POS YouTube app sometimes stops. Netflix and Hulu run better than on my netbook, but it will never replace something with a keyboard that can rest on my belly while I’m lying down.
My android-based tablet was so frustrating with “this page is not responsive” messages every two minutes (literally!) I replaced with the 11" HP Stream that came out last November. Love it. Next year I might buy the new touch-screen version that still comes with a keyboard.
If I ever get this thing running tolerably well–and I’m getting there–I might write a How-To because, at fifty bucks, it could be a helluva present. For now it starts out too tied to Amazon and the web to be any bloody use at all.
But I won’t write it on the 7" Fire. That’s for masochists.
“Real work” by my definition is “work that normally requires a desktop computer.”
I had a client that spent the summer in Prague. She is an architect, and needed to run Autocad, Microsoft Office, SketchUp, a radiosity rendering program and full-blown web browsers. She wanted to plug in a big monitor when she sat down, as well as a full-sized keyboard and mouse. But she also wanted to work anywhere she wanted without hauling a ton of stuff around.
The ONLY answer was a Microsoft Surface Pro 3. An I7 processor, a terabyte of space, 16 gigs of RAM. Ports to drive a large external monitor, external storage, full size USB port - all in a base unit no larger and heavier than any equal size tablet.
She didn’t even have to take it out of her bag when she went through airport security because it was “just a tablet”.
No, you cannot run real programs on an iPad. Trying to do what she had to do on an iPad would drive her nuts. And she and her husband have iPads. He has plenty of Macs. I support both Windows and Macs. I’m non-denominational and will recommend the right tool for the job, and Apple simply does not have the right tool for this job, the there is no indication that the iPad Pro will be any more capable of running desktop apps than an iPhone.
If you can do your job with a $2 Casio calculator watch then it’s real work. Real work is whatever the job is. As for you can’t run “real” programs on an iPad, is it your opinion that these companies aren’t running “real” programs to do “real” work?
Also, a Surface clearly wasn’t the ONLY answer, you could have gotten her a comparably equipped laptop for the same money or less, PC or Mac. You don’t mention why she needed a tablet, so why did you suggest a tablet?
And how is your client running a Surface Pro 3 with 16 gigs of RAM and a 1TB drive? As far as I know, the specs max out at 8GB/512GB and those parts are not user upgradable.
An iPad is a create media consumption device, it’s a fine form-filling device, it’s an ok painting device, but it is miserable as a productivity device.
It has the power of a laptop while having the form factor of a tablet. A laptop has a minimum footprint. You can’t make it occupy less than a couple of square feet of desk space. You can’t get rid of the keyboard of a laptop. She wanted a tablet for presentations, but not have the hassle of moving those presentations from one device to another. She wanted to be able to quickly switch from presentation to modification as the need arose.
My mistake, it was a while ago. 512/8.
I have an iPad and a Surface. And I endorse this (gaffa’s) message.
They are different tools for different problems. And generally the iPad is better at simpler things for simpler people. If that’s you: great. If not: not.
Yeah, the use case of a Surface Pro vs iPad/Kindle Fire is just very different. The Kindle Fire is a cheap Amazon-ified iPad. The Surface Pro is the finally-mature result of a very long, arduous road of Microsoft trying to integrate a laptop with a tablet with a stylus, a much nicer version of the old, crappy “Penabled” laptops. It is a powerful laptop first and foremost (albeit with a small screen), with a touch/pen interface that has finally caught up enough to be useful. It took Windows 7 and 10 to make that hybridization good enough at last. The Surface Pro is one of the best in its class, but it’s not the only one like that (the Lenovo Yoga/Yoga pro is another good choice).
But for most consumers and basic office workers, something like that is just overkill, like using a Uhaul to commute to work every morning. For $50, even if a Kindle Fire only does 1/4th of what a Surface Pro could do, as long as it’s good enough for the job, it can easily be a better value proposition. If it’s not good enough, a used laptop/Transformerbook/Yoga/first-gen Surface Pro might be a better fit.
TL;DR: What LSLGuy said, different tools for different jobs.
I would love a Surface Pro, but…
Wish I could find a cheap battery for my old Toshiba Dynapad T200CS. Win 3.1, 486, and very good handwriting recognition. Great for Project Gutenberg hard-80-column-ASCII text files and retro chic.
A stylus with the Fire makes using it less hellish. I would prefer it pointier, but at least it’s narrower than my fingertip. And has a pen, an utterly useless flashlight, and a frickin’ laser for under three bucks. I’ve made worse purchases.