Articles about Amazon

Earlier this year, 4K televisions and monitors seemed unachievable for the average consumer. Some pundits wrote the technology off, as these displays would be priced out of reach for many people. While this was true initially, Black Friday brought some very affordable 4K televisions to market. And so, the technology seems poised to have longevity.

Unfortunately, 4K content is rather sparse. No matter how great the television or monitor is, without content, there is no point. I have been watching 4K YouTube content on the Dell UltraSharp 32 UltraHD Monitor (UP3214Q) and it looks great. However, puppy videos in 4K hardly justifies the investment! Luckily, Amazon is planning to remedy that.

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Amazon has made a lot of news recently, which probably shouldn't be a surprise, given this is the shopping season and it's one of the most prominent retailers. Much of that buzz has surrounded the latest refresh of the company's line of Android tablets -- the Kindle Fires -- with Cyber Monday deals, and then another one-day sale. But now Amazon is looking to hook up those who can't afford to shell out that full price all at once.

The retail giant has quietly rolled out an installment plan to help you get that tablet. Both the 7-inch and 8.9-inch versions of the Kindle Fire HDX are included in the deal. At checkout, you will need to pony up 25-percent of the retail price, plus any taxes and shipping charges. But, after that, you will just be billed one time every 90 days (three times total) in equal amounts to cover the balance owed.

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Do you have someone on your shopping list who is part of the Amazon ecosystem? Chances are you do, given that anyone with an Android device can install and use the Amazon App Store, Kindle App, MP3 player and more. What you may not be familiar with is something called Amazon Coins.

The currency doesn't get a lot of attention, but it can be used to purchase apps, games and in-app items. Each Coin is essentially the equivalent of a penny -- 500 Coins is the same as $5.

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While children may tout the educational features of tablets to fool adults into buying them, the truth is, no kid wants to use a tablet for education. It's simply a ploy to obtain a new toy on which to play video games and watch movies.

Sadly, some adults are actually responsible and enable these educational features on the device. To the dismay of children across the globe, Amazon announces new educational options for the FreeTime feature on the Kindle Fire line of tablets. In other words, learning is going to severely impact the playing time of Angry Birds.

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Amazon has been all over the news in recent weeks, and much of that has surrounded the Kindle line of E-readers and tablets -- we'll ignore those flying robots that have been on your mind. If you didn't get in on the big Cyber Monday sale, then you'll get a second crack at a deal today.

Amazon is holding a today-only Kindle-fest that features select members of the family at new, lower prices. The basic Kindle E-reader Wi-Fi is down from its regular $69 cost to $56. Other deals available include the 16 GB Kindle Fire HD at only $135, Fire HDX 7 16 GB model for $183 and the Fire HD 8.9 16 GB slashed from $269 down to $229. All of these deals are for the Wi-Fi only versions of the tablets.

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The tablet wars are reaching a boiling point. Microsoft has been releasing videos to show that Surface 2 is better than iPad Air. Then, earlier today, Amazon released a video claiming that the Kindle Fire HDX 8.9 is superior to the iPad Air too. However, the company is not stopping there.

Starting this evening (a bit early), Amazon is lowering the price of the 7-inch variants of the HD and HDX Kindle tablets by $50 for Cyber Monday. This beats both the Nexus 7 and iPad Mini in pricing. In other words, Amazon is going for the jugular of both Google and Apple.

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Apple can take comfort in  the fact that its iPad Air is considered good enough competition to warrant the concern of other manufacturers, but that likely doesn't make the latest TV ads any more palatable to the company. Just recently Microsoft fired a shot with its Surface 2 comparison ads, and now Amazon is getting into the game with its tablet.

A new 30-second clip features a back and forth between the two devices, comparing screen resolution, weight and price. You likely don't need a spoiler alert to figure out which tablet comes out on top.

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More than half of Black Friday sales were conducted online this Thanksgiving according to figures collected by Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). A 10 percentage point increase means that a massive 55 percent of people who shopped for technology products on Black Friday did so online, and both online and offline, consumer electronic devices accounted for more than a third of sales. Shopping started as early as Thanksgiving Day itself with more than 39 million shoppers hitting the stores. But how many of these purchases represent good value for money?

Some 35 percent of all sales this weekend were taken up by tech devices. Of this number, tablets accounted for 29 percent of purchases, which is hardly surprising when you take into account that the likes of Microsoft are dramatically reducing the price of Surface tablets -- there are a number other outlets that have followed suit with this particular tablet as well as numerous others. In the first two days of the holiday weekend sales, 24 percent of tech sales were taken up by headphones, 21 percent by game hardware, 19 percent by smartphones and 17 percent by laptops.

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We are currently in the midst of Black Friday, the traditional kickoff for the holiday shopping season. Despite the fury unleashed on retail locations on this day, Cyber Monday, which is a more recent creation, is still ahead and aims to bring that same excitement to web-based merchants.

While Amazon is currently running numerous deals today, the retailer is already looking ahead to December 2nd. Today the merchant provides a sneak peek at some of the deals it has planned for that day.

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It's Thanksgiving day here in the states and, with the turkey not yet in the oven and football having not kicked off, I thought it appropriate to take a moment to give thanks. No, not for my family or for the chance to live my life the way I do, though all of those are on my list, but for tech products -- this is a technology news site, after all.

I've given careful consideration to this and looked at what I used most over the past year -- the products that got the most hands-on, that provided the best experience. I've whittled that list down to just five, and now its time to share, to give each a hearty thank-you. I'd offer them a bit of pumpkin pie if I could.

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My colleague Alan Buckingham reviewed the Kindle Fire HDX 7 over the weekend. I too have been testing the new HDX variants of Amazon's tablets and share many of my colleague's sentiments. However, for me, one of the most intriguing things about the tablets is not a feature but an associated accessory -- the Origami Case.

If you aren't familiar with the word origami, it is an ancient Japanese art form involving paper-folding. One of the typical clichéd objects to represent with origami is a crane (the bird, not the construction equipment). However, the number of objects to create is limited only by your imagination. Heck, you've probably done origami and never realized it -- ever make a paper airplane in school? Well, it turns out you were an artist; not a troublemaker!

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There is no shortage of variety in today's Android tablet market. Devices come in a range of functionality and price, and from a host of makers. Two prominent tablets on the market are from a couple of the web's biggest sites, and both Amazon and Google are hoping their devices will land under your tree this holiday season.

The second generation of the Nexus 7, manufactured by Asus and sold by Google, has been on the market for some time, but now Amazon is pushing the third version of the Kindle Fire tablet. This latest iteration is, of course, purported to be the best, but is it? Can the HDX really be better than the 2012 HD?

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Sony PlayStation 4 hit the stores and Brian not only took a look at the brand new console, but also cracked open the case and slipped a larger hard drive inside. Brian wasn't alone in his love of the PS4, more than a million people also bought a console on the day of launch. But not everyone was happy as many units were found to suffer from a Blue Light of Death problem that rendered them unusable. Raspberry Pi was also celebrating its sales figures as more than two million were shifted since its launch last year.

In a rare show of unity, Microsoft and Google joined forces to help tackle the problem of online child pornography. At the same time, Microsoft took its Scroogled campaign to a new level by releasing merchandise (although Joe was impressed). Elsewhere online, Twitter introduced Twitter alerts to the UK and Ireland to help provide people with critical information in an emergency.

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If there is one thing I hate, it is paying for subscriptions. As new services come out and I subscribe, it feels like money is just being siphoned from my wallet. Entertainment services alone are bleeding me dry -- Netflix, Hulu Plus and Google Play Music All Access to name a few. Even though I detest subscriptions, there is one that I am happy to pay for -- Amazon Prime.

Now, I do not want to sound like a commercial for Amazon, but it is truly a service that delivers exponential value. You see, besides offering a plethora of TV shows and movies for free, it also enables free two-day shipping for physical products. I shop at the website so much, that the paltry $79 annual fee pays for itself rather quickly. As a computer nerd, getting something like a 120mm fan or PCI card in two days at no cost is awesome. Today, the company announces that you can now send a Prime subscription as a gift.

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We are just over a week away from Black Friday, the traditional kickoff of the holiday shopping season. It's the day when normally sedate citizens forget their manners and trample anyone standing between them and the desired item. Much of this tradition has moved online in recent years, but the scene at retail stores still borders on crazy.

While the offerings of many locations have been leaking out to the internet over the past few days, three of the heavy hitters stand out. Microsoft, while running a number of brick and mortar stores, is traditionally an online entity, Amazon is completely internet-based and Sears is an old-school physical location retailer that has tried to make the online move. Three businesses in very different positions.

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