If you're not a tech-savvy individual, and you have very low requirements for tablet functionality, or if you are looking for a budget device to entertain children who won't do more than watch video, read and play light games, then you're better off just paying for exactly what you need when you buy the Amazon Fire tablet.
At a price of around $50 or £50, it would be a crime to expect more than what you pay for though it will do good to know if the Amazon Fire actually does well in performing your minimum requirement.
The CNET review declares that the Amazon Fire is the best option for money-saving customers who don't care about high technology, or who can live without Google.
Price is the best thing that this tablet has got going for it: the review points out that you can get six of these tablets when you pay for five and what was paid for is still less than the cost of an Apple iPad Mini 2. Not bad if you are planning to gift them to six recipients during the holiday season.
The Amazon Fire runs on Amazon's Fire OS 5 Bellini, which can access Amazon's media library but not Google Play Store. This means that you will get great value if you are an Amazon Prime member. The OS feels like it was built primarily with Amazon members in mind so that they can easily access all the TV shows, movies, music and games in the Amazon store.
Technically, storage is at 5.6GB of free storage but at least now the Amazon Fire has an expandable capacity up to 128GB. All you need to do is buy a microSD card. If you don't, what's the use of buying it if viewing entertainment is the main reason you're buying it in the first place?
Performance is not slow either, not unless you make it run on too many apps in the background. It has a quad-core 1.3GHz processor and 1GB of RAM that is good enough for simple use.
There are some minor bugs that won't bother the truly patient though be warned that tap response is delayed, indicating that the touchscreen may require more pressure than usual.
PC Advisor, on the other hand, points out that buying something this cheap means you have to put up with the ads on the lock screen. In fact, you have to pay an extra fee of up to £10 or $10 just to get rid of them.
Don't expect much from the front and rear cameras. The front has a 640x480 resolution and not even good enough for Skype calls while the rear camera makes smudgy photos and shaky videos.
Battery life lasts up to seven hours while charging takes almost six hours with the main adaptor.
Earlier, it was mentioned that this budget tablet may do well as a kid's toy, but Amazon doesn't think so. The same tablet on Kids Edition actually costs twice as much - but that gives you a year's subscription to Fire for Kids and a two-year 'worry free' guarantee.
In short, you get what you pay for with this tablet, which is good if you only need the bare essentials and are not expecting much.
