Amazon Unveils The Fire Phone

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Amazon has taken the wraps of the Fire Phone. Thoughts?

Amazon's first ever phone has a 4.7-inch Gorilla Glass display with a HD resolution screen (we're assuming it's 720p). That makes it the same size as the Moto X, which was also supposed to be a phone for the masses. It also has a rubberized frame with aluminium buttons, 32GB of storage, a quad-core 2.2GHz processor, Adreno 330 GPU and 2GB of RAM. As for the camera, there's a 13-megapixel rear-facing one equipped with a f/2.0 lens and optical image stabilization.
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So, it's a $199.00 2-year contract phone that comes pre-installed with a plethora of proprietary Amazon sales and marketing software? If I'm locked into the Amazon "ecosystem", like the Kindle, you better give me the phone for free on-contract or sell it for < $350.00 off contract.
 
Well, you get "free" prime for a year, so that's technically $100 right there. If you already have prime, you still get 12 more months free.

The build quality, camera and dynamic perspective look interesting to me. As a big prime user (Books, video, shopping...) I could get into this.
 
It's just a phone. A crappy phone with no SD card slot. A Galaxy S5 has a 2.1 Ghz Quad core with Adreno 330 or Mali GPU and 2GB of RAM. It also has microSD slot with up to 128 GB, and I can put custom roms onto it easily.

Why would anyone want the Fire Phone? Especially since it's only on AT&T, cause everyone just loves that company.
 
Has anyone found the plan cost, data limitations, etc???
 
"Stating how it's difficult to use phones these days, Bezos also announced..."

Difficult? For who? Which ones are he referring to? The old dumbphones with 300 buttons per side?
 
This is a Facebook Phone flop. There's absolutely no advantage of using this phone, especially at a $200 contract price, versus other phones on the market. Unless you're an absolute Amazon fanatic, which by my deductions you already own a smartphone and some version of the Kindle Fire, then I see literally no advantages ESPECIALLY being AT&T only and being locked into a two year contract.

Bezos has some wild ideas, but this is not a good one.
 
$749 for the 64GB version? Well they certainly aren't trying to undercut other high-end handsets. I don't see the point, the Kindle Fire HDX is at least good value as it attempts to lock you into the Amazon ecosystem, this doesn't appear to be.
 
Meh -- there's not a thing out there that can touch my 350 dollar off contract Nexus 5 and 43 dollars a month via Straight Talk.

(yup 43) i buy codes online at discount through 3rd party.
 
My guess, it uses any standard AT&T data plan. Don't get me wrong, I'm an AT&T customer with a Prime membership, but there's no way I'm going to pick this phone over a G3, M8, SGS5 or 5S simply because it integrates with the Amazon marketplace or has a silly 3D illusion effect. If anything, I want less crap installed on my smartphone, not more. AT&T has en exclusive because they were the only ones stupid enough to throw money at it. :)
 
In summary, it's "Wow, are you ever late to the party. Want to help clean up the kitchen?"
 
720P screen? Really? This phone is already taking the course of what the Wii U took when it was first released.
 
Why in the he'll would you get this .. he'll Verizon was doing buy one get one on HTC ones . They should have priced this the same as the nexus 5 or not bothered with it at all. 200 on contract is what you pay for any new cutting edge phone and this one is not at all cutting edge. 720p screen hahha my HTC DNA has a 1080p screen and it's old for a smart phone .
 
$749 off contract? No thanks. I will stick with my Nexus 4 and see what Google has up their sleeve at Google I/O next week.
 
amazon is trying to really lock people into their ecosystem. same way google and apple is.

agreed that they are late to the game. waste of time for people that love their apple or android
 
So generally last years high end hardware for this years high end price with a proprietary OS that is not great at anything but just merely usable. At $650 and $750 the G3, Z2, S5, Oneplus one all do the same thing on a non-proprietary OS with better hardware for either the same price or cheaper.

Amazon has gone crazy lately, the Prime price increase and now this really lackluster phone.
 
whoa, whoa, i'm not saying that i'll switch, but the firefly service looks really cool. For what I need it just needs to be adopted or at least supported by the enterprise people. The iPhone is almost ubiquitous where i'm at and as such IT has bent over backwards to support the phone.
 
I was a little surprised and optimistic about the ideas if not the product itself. But then again I not invested in a 'high profile phone' to feel defensive about.

720p on that size is plenty functional.
 
It's "for the masses", but is an AT&T exclusive and $200 on contract. Couldn't stop laughing enough to finish the article.
 
jpm100 said:
720p on that size is plenty functional.
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720p on a quality display is fine. Not much difference between 720p on my Note II and 1080p on my other Note 3. They're both equally gorgeous SAMOLED.
 
I like amazon and I like my prime, but I fail completely to see why I would want this phone? I buy phones not from the carrier so I don't have to deal with all their pre-installed garbage, why would I want it from Amazon? Especially when there are flatly nicer phones out for the same money (SGS5).

Gonna be honest, calling this on DOA. Just don't see any appeal at all.
 
Unless it comes with the Unicorn of Cell Phones (Unlimited 4G Data), I don't see it.
 
As an admitted Amazon Prime user and liker, this phone is just as pointless as I expected it to be from the rumors, though way more expensive than I expected. I'm not going to get one, but I did expect a much better entry price, regardless of how unnecessary I find these strange new features to be; unless they know something we don't, and that millions of people are already in line to buy one.
 
Ashbringer said:
It's just a phone. A crappy phone with no SD card slot. A Galaxy S5 has a 2.1 Ghz Quad core with Adreno 330 or Mali GPU and 2GB of RAM. It also has microSD slot with up to 128 GB, and I can put custom roms onto it easily.

Why would anyone want the Fire Phone? Especially since it's only on AT&T, cause everyone just loves that company.
Click to expand...

It might actually fit in your pocket unlike all the Phablets Samsung sells. I seriously don't know how people can pack those gigantic phones around all the time especially in the summer. And sadly they're are just getting bigger and bigger.
 
Anybody remember the facebook phone? Yeah put this right next to it. Maybe if they released this for free w/ contract and any carrier. But same price as sgs5 or iphone...

I luv me some amazon and use prime quite regularly, but they are starting to make some dumbass decisions. This and the music streaming are prime examples (pun intended).

Glad I don't own their stock. It might get a short pop, but keep this up and it's going to the toilet quickly.
 
lb2-4188-1.jpg


I can't stop laughing at this. So the Amazon phone takes overexposed photos?
 
Megalith said:
lb2-4188-1.jpg


I can't stop laughing at this. So the Amazon phone takes overexposed photos?
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No, it's capable of taking the same photos at slightly higher shutter speeds with less noise due to being f2.0 and having larger individual receptor cells than the samsung. It takes it with slightly slower shutter speed than the iphone does because it has smaller receptors. In order to look less noisy, and have the fastest shutter speed it cna eke out, it appears to underexpose the image than bump exposure by software while applying a bit of denoise. This is my guess based on the fact that their image appears to have clipped blacks and messed up highlights along with poor contrast compared to the other two.

Regardless of me being right, that image is nothing to be bragging about. If I wanted to make things look the best possible by post processing, I'd pick the iphone image out of those three. It appears to ahve preserved the most dynamic range and is capable of freezing the action more under those lighting conditions, which means less motion blur to deal with.
 
So, Android with an Amazon theme and store. Not at all original. Also, would not surprise me to find the Lumia 1020 and 1520 to take better pictures than that.
 
Fanattic said:
It might actually fit in your pocket unlike all the Phablets Samsung sells. I seriously don't know how people can pack those gigantic phones around all the time especially in the summer. And sadly they're are just getting bigger and bigger.
Click to expand...

My Lumia 1520 with slim case fits in my pockets just fine, and it's bigger than the Note 3.
 
PNut12345 said:
My Lumia 1520 with slim case fits in my pockets just fine, and it's bigger than the Note 3.
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You sir certainly have larger clothes than I do lol. That Lumia is massive it's twice the size of a 5s (in volume) and over 40% larger than a Galaxy S5. Lol 6.4 inches long! does your penis get jealous sharing trouser space with something that size?
 
RGMBill said:
I thought with Apple and the exploding batteries there were already Fire Phones?
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Now see, if I go and make a joke about Android for years ago you'd call me an idiot apple fan boi who is too stupid to realize what a good phone Android really is.


Everyone, Android users are the new iphone users of 2007/2008...just they've been apple users since 2010, which is twice as long as iphone users were annoying.
 
Google Model: Revenue generated by selling user information and habits to anyone. Subsidizes cost to end user.

Amazon Model: Revenue generated by encouraging (diverting) users to purchases products and services through Amazon. Subsidizes cost to end user.

Apple Model: Revenue generated by having customers pay high entry fee. No subsidizing.

To be honest, I think Apples is the most straight forward and I kind of respect it in that perspective. Ya Apple charges a lot for their product. But that's it. No sneaking behind your back or manipulating.
 
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