More Kindle thoughts.

Ever since acquiring the Kindle Fire HD, I've actually not touched my Kindle Keyboard. Ever. Till today. I had errands to run that I knew I would have to wait about. I thought about bringing out the HD, but it is not as easy to carry around without a bag - the regular kindle slips into my jacket's pocket - and as I was going to be doing lots of walking, didn't want to have a weight on me the whole day.

And it was great! The kindle whilst still sizable, is just so light and I'd totally forgotten how good reading a book on it just is. One thing I am very pleased about both of them is content. I'd picked up some books to read, and in seconds, the kindle had it downloaded. The fire had to have the individual books be clicked upon to be downloaded, but not much of an issue.

I see them as very different entertainment devices (I almost put tool... but I think I could live without either of them...) - the kindle really as a damned good ebook reader. Well, within reason, given it's black and white. Also, factor in its light weight, good size, and a battery that lasts for days if not weeks. Worldwide 3G is great too.

The fire OTOH is really more for content consumption and tablet gaming, and ebook reading second. I won't advocate watching movies on there, but snugged up in bed in the dark with music playing and reading a book or enjoying a light time killing game. It is a winner.

I came across the paperwhite kindles at a stationery shop yesterday and whilst it looked interesting, somehow the touch screen did not appeal to be. Perhaps if I actually owned one I'd change my mind. But hopefully my kindle will last a good long while as I really enjoy it!

Unity + Kindle Fire HD

Quick test, took about two hours from purchase to get all the downloads and sdks installed to what you see on the vid. The main issue I encountered was the rigid bodies going to sleep - didn't know about them and took awhile to find out info about that. Else everything else was pretty straightforward; copied the sdk to my home dir, set up paths, and just one hot key to install the game on the kindle.

A few other thoughts on the kindle fire - it's really nice to be able to read a book and listen to mp3s at the same time. The regular kindle can do it via the experimental modes, but it's nowhere as slick. Another aspect about book reading is page turning. The kindle has two big physical buttons on either side of the screen that allows me to page forward and backwards. Very convenient, especially if held one handed. The kindle fire has the left and right "sides" of the virtual page set up for backwards and forward page turning respectively. So if I accidentally turned more pages than I wanted, I'd to touch the left side of the screen.

An hour with the Kindle Fire HD

Got a new Kindle Fire HD in the mail, just to see what practical use I might find for a tablet as well as to explore exporting unity to android.

A bit under the weather so I'll just list out my thoughts:

- Great screen
- Very solid feel, with a matte finish.
- Speakers seem to have pretty good bass.
- Seems pretty responsive
- Kindle's white charger works with the Kindle Fire.

Things I found odd
- Rearward Speakers

For reading purposes in reasonable lighting conditions, I still say the regular kindle has the edge. The Kindle Fire is just more tiring on my eyes, even though the fonts are sooo beautiful. The only advantage I can think of is low light reading - here the kindle fire shines. But on the flip side, it is quite weighty - the kindle I can hold in one hand for extended periods. Not so much with the fire. Oh oh, I can view the covers in full colour, that's nice :3

Another thing I liked about the Kindle Fire is the content I've purchased on Amazon are now available on the tablet (they still need to be downloaded though). It's pretty fast on a wifi connection, and listening to the music I've purchased in the past being streamed in is really damned convenient.

Other things like youtube and soundcloud work, which is great. Browsing on a tablet is a new experience for me though - some sites that require click and drag just don't work. Boo.

To Zanarkand | 2013

Getting rid of my digital piano, so here's one last piece on it. This is To Zanarkand, played in full. Took nearly half a year to be able to play the double speed section.