14 DAY TRIAL // The Kindle Fire was and still is a very convenient buy, at $199 / 157 Euro, but it might soon become even more appealing, if what rumors around the web say is true.
Back in May, we mentioned that Amazon was going to launch a bigger and better Kindle Fire tablet this summer. The screen would be of 10 inches in diagonal, instead of 7.
If it is going to stick to its tactics, though, it will have to tweak the price of its current device.
For those not familiar with Amazon's modus operandi, the online store sells the tablet for so little money because the Kindle Fire is, in the end, just a means of bringing its other products and virtual content closer to users.
In other words, Amazon isn't making a profit off the tablet itself, but it does reap a lot of cash off the purchases made through it.
The 10.1-inch Kindle Fire, should it become reality, will either take the place of the 7-incher at the $199 price point or ship for a bit extra.
We suspect the latter, since Digitimes mentions a new $199 / 157 Euro 7-inch slate, with a display resolution of 1,280 x 800 pixels (instead of 1024 x 600).
To have a chance at scoring orders even with those two overshadowing it, the current Kindle Fire will sell for $149 / 118 Euro (in a few weeks most likely).
Amazon's Kindle Fire sold 4.5-5 million units in the fourth quarter of 2011, but the number dropped to 700,000-800,000 in the first quarter of 2012 because the company didn't offer it in areas outside the US.
All in all, the vague timeline is as follows: a new 7-inch Kindle Fire will appear in the third quarter (July-August), followed by a 10.1-incher in the fourth quarter or early 2013.
There was another item, an 8.9-inch tablet, in development, but those plans have been sacked. Last we heard, there still was a possibility of them being moved forward, but recent data contradicts this.