Pogue does not love the new Kindle Fire

I was excited to hear about the Kindle Fire. But I was waiting to read some impartial reviews of one before running off and buying one. After all I am a big fan of the Kindle (gen 2) and enjoy reading books on Kindles. And, believe it or not, I don't yet own an iPad.

So the Fire seems like a match made in heaven, right?

Well, today David Pogue, tech reporter of the New York Times kind of reviewed the Fire (along with the other new, low end Kindles.) Well, the punchline is, he loves the new inexpensive Kindles, but he does NOT love the new Fire, which by the way, isn't 'expensive' at $200, it's just less incredibly cheap than the other new models. Here's a short bit:

(Admitedly the most negative paragraph:)

"Most problematic, though, the Fire does not have anything like the polish or speed of an iPad. You feel that $200 price tag with every swipe of your finger. Animations are sluggish and jerky — even the page turns that you’d think would be the pride of the Kindle team. Taps sometimes don’t register. There are no progress or “wait” indicators, so you frequently don’t know if the machine has even registered your touch commands. The momentum of the animations hasn’t been calculated right, so the whole thing feels ornery." (from David Pogue in the New York Times)

By the way there are lots of other Fire reviews on the web today.