Larger Kindle Fire coming soon, say moles
Holiday surge to be followed by spring sproing?
If you're thinking of plopping down a brace of Benjamins for a 7-inch Kindle Fire this holiday season, you might think of waiting a couple of months for the 8.9-inch version, which looks increasingly likely to be released next spring.
According to the lastest rumor from the Taiwanese market-watchers at DigiTimes, unidentified sources say that Foxconn will begin pumping out the slightly less-li'l fellow in the middle of the second quarter of 2012.
Last Friday, as Kindle-conscious Reg readers will remember, Taipei-based Citi analyst Kevin Chang said that TMS – another division of Hon Hai, Foxconn's parent company – was manufacturing "the 8.9-inch Amazon tablet".
A larger Kindle Fire has been rumored for some time to be in the works, and earlier this month the rumor mill indicated that Amazon had settled on an 8.9-inch display for its next model.
The loss-leading $199 Kindle Fire burst onto the market last Tuesday, with ChangeWave Research reporting that among the 3,043 consumers they surveyed, 2 per cent had already ordered one, 5 per cent saying the were very likely to buy one, and 12 per cent putting themselves in the "somewhat likely" camp.
In a far less scientific survey, your Reg reporter visited his local Best Buy über-retailer over the weekend to check out the tablet feeding frenzy, and found crowds, well, crowding the Apple iPad and Kindle Fire displays, leaving the plethora of other tablets – Samsung's Galaxy Tab, Motorola's Xoom, et al. – cold and lonely.
When asked how the Kindle Fire was selling, a Best Buy manager told your reporter that "It's going to be our biggest seller this season." And it's not even Thanksgiving yet.
But if you're jonesing for a Kindle Fire and you find out that all 6 million are sold out for this holiday season, buck up. It seems that an 8.9-inch version may very well be available in time to celebrate May Day, Mother's Day, or Memorial Day. ®
COMMENTS
Screw this for pickup full of Porcupine burgers!
I have had enough. Enough of moles, and leaks and morons from those investment companies or whatever they are constantly trying to guess what the hell some scum hole of a Chinese factory is making for some bunch of over eager kool aid obsessed idiots of the most titanic nature.
I. Do. Not. Care. Yes this story is the one that has finally driven me over the edge.
Why am I commenting then? Because I can. And because I feel the need to be down voted to death by a group of people so moronically and zealously infatuated with the next "cool" thing that they wouldn't even notice if they got run over by a Challenger 2 at top speed while standing naked in the middle of Time square on New Years Eve!
I can't let El Reg escape my wrath either. Why for the love of all that is blue do you continually, and it seems to me more than ever now, publish these bloody things? What is the point? What is it going to do? If you want to know what a company is going to be doing next year, and you want to tell the world about it, then have the common sense and decency to go straight to the source. As the source will most likely not tell you then steal the damn information. Don't want to steal the information so that you can actually print something tangible? Fine! OK, so stop running these epically pointless and annoying stories and learn some damn patience.
I wonder if this will even get published...
Another
person who joined The Register just to compare the Fire unfavourably with the iPad...
I wonder if this will even get published... ?
Of course it'll get published. This is The Reg. Only directly criticising Orlowski will get your comment pulled here.
I too get a wee bit irritated by the constant rumour and speculation about shiny new toys. But we know why it's done: It's because people thinking about buying product X want to know if they should wait for product Y to come on the market, either because Y is better, or X will then drop in price.
Naturally it would be better still to just settle for X now, if it's good enough for your needs, or take a long hard look at your life style and realise that X, Y and even Z are irrelevant distractions of the consumer age and you'd be better off just reading a good book.
But that's not going to happen, is it?
Cool, more crap hardware from Amazon. Let the making fun commence!
Like it or not...
Most customers will judge the Fire against the iPad and will find the Fire significantly cheaper. When you're hungry and all you've got is a pocketful of change, a $2 hot dog looks better than a $5 sandwich.
