December 29, 2014
Feedback submitted!Unable to submit feedback! Having used a lot of Samsung and Apple smartphones, I wasn't expecting much from the Fire Phone, but I must admit, I have been pleasantly surprised.I was a bit skeptical about not having Google Services on this phone, but after using it for a few days I can't say I really miss it much. The included email application is good and works easily with both my GMail and Yahoo accounts. The maps program has built in navigation. I do miss having Chrome browser history shared between my browser and phone like it was with my Galaxy, but the Silk browser works just as well.Build quality is actually very good. The front and back are both high quality Gorilla Glass 3, but I am not 100% sold on the plastic edges. As a bonus, they are very grippy making the phone more difficult to drop, but on the downside the edge between the plastic and glass is noticeable.I am really impressed with how well dynamic perspective works, and it makes menial tasks like scrolling in a web browser by tilting the phone or pulling out the side menu very easy and is extremely reliable, much more so than eye scrolling. The lock screen is really cool because you can use the dynamic perspective to peek behind objects in the photo/scene. They include some games that use the perspective as well, like a clay modeling program, a puzzle game where you rotate a cube, and a cheesy game where you can play games with a monkey (peekaboo sorts of games and interacting with it).One thing I don't like with many Android phones is they are a hodgepodge of Apps and settings and don't really seem coherent. Amazon has done a good job making a very coherent and well designed product that feels very polished. Honestly it works as seamlessly as an iOS product as far as I am concerned. I know I will get down-voted by iOS fans for saying that.The screens are responsive, the icons are nice looking, the phone, message, mail, and browser icons are always easy to find, there isn't a lot of unnecessary widgets and clutter. The phone didn't really need any customization out of the box.The phone has the typical grid arrangement of Apps or you can pull down on the screen and bring up a carousel view which shows recent or pinned applications as long as their recent content (like Silk browser pages, combined email inbox, or Prime Music songs). This is a really neat view for quick access to frequently used applications.Battery life seems pretty typical based on my use. Similar to my Galaxy S4. Turning off dynamic perspective could extend this a bit, but I actually really like the feature.Mayday is a built in support App which I haven't tried yet, and Firefly works well for identifying products, shows, and music. I love that the camera has a hard button for turning it on and taking photos, this is much quicker and more stable than using soft shutter release buttons. The camera image stabilization works okay, but the flash seems to be a bit weak (or maybe just how camera chooses to expose). The face detect circles are nice and the camera seems to easily be able to recognize faces, even in fairly low light.The only real drawback to the Fire Phone is not having easy access to the play store, but I find many Apps are basically mobile web browser sites, so many of them aren't necessary at all other than for notifications, so if you don't find your App, maybe check the companies website and see if the mobile version will work just as well (this is especially true for financial Apps). I was worried this was going to be a deal breaker for me, in fact I bought the phone planning on trading it in for a different device, but I plan on keeping it now.P.S., Recommend to check it best price at www.seebestdeals.com/?p=1744Hope it helps.