Amazon Kindle Fire 7 (2017) Unboxing and First Impressions

How about another quick unboxing? This time I’ve got another tablet, it’s the Amazon Kindle Fire 7! The direct competitor to my recently unboxed and benchmarked NOOK Tablet 7. So let’s get this Kindle out of the box and see how it stacks up!

In the Box

Let’s start with what comes in the box. First thing you’ll see is the tablet, on this tray style packaging, same as the other Kindle Fire devices. Then out comes the same short micro USB cable. Followed by the wall charger. This one looks like a 5 Volt, 1 Amp charger. Now we’ve got some info cards, as usual. And that looks like everything.

Tour

After we’ve got the Fire 7 out of the plastic wrap, we can take a look around it. On the bottom there’s nothing at all. On the right is a covered microSD card slot. On the left it’s also blank. The top is where most of the ports and buttons are. We’ve got the power button, the micro USB input for charging and data, a microphone, the 3.5mm headset jack, and the volume rocker.

Specs

OS: Android 5.1.1 Lollipop, Fire OS 5.3.6.4

SoC: MediaTek MT8127

CPU: Quad Core (2x A7 @ 1.3GHz)

GPU: Mali-450 MP4

RAM: 1GB DDR3

Storage: 8GB (3.02GB available)

Screen: 7" 1024x600 IPS LCD

WiFi: 802.11 a/b/g/n dual band

BT: 4.0

Cameras: VGA Front (480p) and 2MP Rear (720p)

Speakers: Mono (rear-firing)

Battery: 2980mAH

This 7” tablet is running Android 5.1.1 like most Fire devices, except the HD 8. Fire OS 6, which will bring Android 7 Nougat with it, is slated for release to all Fire tablets by the end of the month. I’m hoping they stick to that, because Lollipop is quite old in December of 2018. Currently it’s running Fire OS 5.3.6.4. The rest of this hardware looks identical to my 2015 Amazon Kindle Fire 7. It’s the MediaTek MT8127. That's a quad core ARM Cortex-A7 running at a maximum of 1.3GHz. These Cortex A7s are getting pretty old by now too, they were first announced in 2011. The on board GPU is a Mali 450 MP4, which is about as old, first announced in 2012. This system on a chip was actually released in 2014 though, and it’s paired with 1GB of pretty slow DDR3 1333MHz RAM. The on board storage is 8GB, with only 3.02GB free on first boot. Luckily it does have that micro SD card slot. The screen is a 7" IPS LCD with a resolution of 1024x600. WiFi is a pretty good though, with 802.11 a/b/g/ and n dual band, so both 2.4 and 5GHz support. The Bluetooth is 4.0.

The tablet has two cameras. The front camera is VGA, or 640x480 and can shoot video at a maximum of 480p. The rear camera is 2MP and can shoot in 720p. There’s a single rear firing speaker and the battery is listed as 2,980 mAh.

First Boot and First Impressions

On first boot, we’re greeted by what’s becoming a tradition on these tablets, an update. This one took a while too, about 25 minutes. After that I was able to get into the launcher, install some apps, and browse around the UI.

Remember what I said about identical specs to my older 2015 Fire 7? Yeah, this thing feels nearly identical to that now 3 year old tablet. I guess that says a lot though, that my 2015 tablet is running the same version of the OS as the 2017 model. Saying a lot though, doesn’t automatically mean good. This is already a not so great experience, so this isn’t looking good for the impending comparison with my new NOOK Tablet 7”.

Here’s a spoiler for that comparison now. The NOOK is thinner, a bit smaller in all dimensions, but has the same size screen. The NOOK Tablet 7” also has a bigger battery, feels nicer in the hand, and, on paper at least, has the faster processor. One thing the Fire 7 has though, is definitely a brighter, more vivid screen. Especially for the low $49.99 price tag. I can’t wait to stack these two tablet up head to head.

Buy one for yourself directly from Amazon: 8GB with Special Offers: $49.99

That’s all for this short unboxing, I hope you enjoyed it! I’ve got the usual benchmarks coming up, followed by some comparisons with the new NOOK Tablet 7. That's all for this one, so thanks for reading, and have a great day!