Amazon has just blown the doors off their press event by introducing the new Kindle Fire HD, a new 8.9-inch tablet with an amazing 1920×1200 resolution display, which features In-Plane Switching (IPS) and 254pixel per inch. The display also features Advanced True Wide Polarizing Filter, for full spectrum color at all angles. On top of the display, it features a Laminated Touch Sensor for no air gap, sharper, clearer and better contrast and 25% less glare.
The Kindle Fire HD features the new OMAP 4470 processor from Texas Instruments (TI), which they say destroys the Tegra 3 by more than half in performance tests, like memory bandwidth and floating point operations per second. Bezos then called out the iPad, saying it features only mono sound, with only one speaker. The Fire HD features dual speakers and true Dolby Digital Plus surround sound.
The Kindle Fire HD also uses two, yes two, Wifi antenna’s with 5GHz radio bands (like the iPad 3), instead of the tired old 2.4GHz, this means a better connection without your hands getting in the way. Amazon claims the Fire HD has the fastest WiFi speeds, up to 32Mbps, compared to the iPad 3′s 22Mbps and the Nexus 7′s 20Mbps. By using MIMO, the Kindle Fire uses objects in the environment to boost its signal.
A really nice feature is X-Ray for movies, see an actor on screen, tap pause and you’re presented with the x-ray option, tap it and it brings up IMDB (another Amazon property) and tells you who that actor is and gives you their bio. Whispersync for games, allows you to store your progress and then move to another device and bring that data with you. Another big change is Email, the previous Kindle’s email was lackluster, but with the Fire HD, users get world-class exchange support, faster access, improved sync, contacts and calendars for Gmail, Yahoo and hotmail.
The Kindle Fire HD also supports a front-facing camera which is HD quality, it also come with Skype so you can now make HD video calls. If you have children who love to play with tablets, you can now use the Kindle’s Time Limits feature, which allows parents to set time restraints on content viewed like videos, apps and books. It even supports multiple users, as in more than one child.
The Kindle Fire HD is starting out with 16GB of on board storage instead of the typical 8GB on the normal Kindle Fire, mainly due to a lot of HD content, which takes up a lot more space. The 7-inch HD tablet will be available on September 14th at only at $199 and the 8.9-inch version goes on sale November 20 for $299. But that wasn’t enough, Amazon upped the ante and introduced third HD tablet, a Kindle Fire HD with 4G LTE. The LTE model will be 8.9-inches and will also come with 32GB of storage for $499, the LTE model will also ship on November 20. All of the tablets announced today can be pre-ordered today.