亚马逊Kindle Fire：是新星还是流星？

    Kindle Fire并非划时代的革命性产品，但它确实是亚马逊公司（Amazon）有史以来最重要的产品。

    亚马逊积17年之功，终于推出了Kindle Fire这款产品，填补了亚马逊公司庞大发展版图上缺失的一环。1994年，首席执行官杰夫•贝索斯首次在车库里创建商店，成为公司发展的雏形。此后，公司推出了各种服务，但它们互不相干、缺乏协调。Kindle Fire的问世终于将这些服务融为一体。Fire能阅读电子书，在线购物，还能下载电影和音乐。它采用的是一款依托于云的网络浏览器浏览网络。并且，它的定位忠于其制造者敏锐的零售嗅觉，售价要比其最大的竞争对手，苹果公司（Apple）的iPad，要便宜至少300美元。

    最大的疑问在于，它的优势体现在哪儿？

    Fire的机身模仿了黑莓（Blackberry）的PlayBook平板电脑，只不过做工更精致。它机身更窄，按键更少，边框也更窄。这也绝非巧合：这两款产品是由同一家公司生产的。Fire不会赢得像iPad 2那么高的回头率，但拿在手上也不会显得掉价。它像是一件晚礼服，裁剪精致又风格低调，无意于表现自己是如何时髦炫目。

    和以往的Kindle一样，Fire也差不多是一本较薄的中等尺寸的平装书大小。它比巴诺书店（Barnes & Noble's）的Nook Color更轻盈，长时间握持也不会感到疲劳。它拥有一块防刮擦的7英寸彩色屏幕，机身后部的漆层触感柔软、犹如橡胶。机身的顶部是两个小型扬声器，音量大小足以观赏电影（前提是离得够近）。

    机身内部拥有一颗双核的1G处理器，512MB缓存，足以实现流畅自如的运行。Fire还自带8G储存空间，可用来存储书籍、电影、文档和软件。亚马逊公司称，WiFi关闭状态下，电池可用8小时；一直看电影的话，电池可用7.5小时，这听起来还算不错。如果打开WiFi，那就得多充几次电了：根据我的经验，如果运行日常各种任务，如浏览网页、观赏电影及阅读电子书，那就得每隔6.5小时充一次电。这种表现还算不错。但是，iPad在WiFi打开的情况下待机时间是10小时，Nook平板电脑则宣称WiFi关闭下，它的待机时间长达11.5小时，与这两者相比，Fire就处于下风了。

    The Kindle Fire isn't a revolutionary device, but it is Amazon's most important product ever.

    The culmination of 17 years of work, the Kindle Fire is the missing piece of the company's vast corporate puzzle, bringing into harmony nearly every discordant service the company has built since CEO Jeff Bezos first set up shop in his garage in 1994. The Fire reads e-books, shops online, downloads movies and music. It surfs the Web with a cloud-based web browser. And, true to its maker's sharp-nosed retail roots, it undercuts its biggest competitor, the Apple (AAPL) iPad, by at least $300.

    The big question is, is it any good?

    The Fire's case resembles the BlackBerry (RIM) PlayBook tablet, only more refined. It's less wide, has fewer buttons and a thinner bezel. That isn't a coincidence: they're made by the same company. Amazon's (AMZN) Fire won't turn as many heads as the iPad 2, but you won't be ashamed to bandy it about either. The Fire is like a tuxedo, finely tailored even if it doesn't announce itself as something flamboyant.

    Like Kindles past, the Fire is roughly the size of a thin, medium-sized paperback. Lighter than Barnes & Noble's (BN) Nook Color, it's easy to hold the Fire for long periods of time without getting tired. A scratch-resistant 7-inch color display takes up the front, while the back is covered in a soft-touch paint that feels almost like rubber. Up top, two small speakers produce solid volume for watching movies (at close range).

    Inside, a dual-core 1GHz processor and 512 MB of RAM keep performance snappy. The Fire also comes with 8 GB of built-in storage for books, movies, documents and apps. The company says you'll get 8 hours of battery life in between charges with WiFi off and 7.5 hours of battery life of straight movie-viewing, which sounds about right. With WiFi on, expect to plug the Fire in more frequently: in my experience, a mix of daily activities like web browsing, movie watching and reading meant recharging every 6.5 hours. That's acceptable, but not exceptional when compared to the iPad 2's 10 hours with WiFi on or the Nook Tablet's touted 11.5 hours with WiFi off.