Amazon's Kindle Fire Gets Strong Preorder Sales: Leaked Report

Preorders for Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet are strong more than a month before it officially goes on sale, a leaked sales report to tech site Cult of Android states.

It is rumored that Amazon has received more than 250,000 preorders for the $199 tablet computer in the five days since its launch. The tablet, which is now available for preorder, should be shipped from Nov. 15.

Amazon, which is known for its aggressive pricing strategy, didn't disappoint when setting a value on its Kindle Fire. The market was expecting a price in the region of $250. At $199, the 7-inch Android-based tablet is priced 60 per cent below its competitors.

Content is an area where Amazon will hold an advantage, with the device capable of leveraging Amazon's recent cloud drive storage capability. The Amazon Kindle Fire will come with a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime and extra content like the capacity to stream movies.

Kindle Fire, which runs on Amazon's customized version of the Android OS, is powered by a dual-core OMAP 4 processor from Texas Instruments and also sports a multi-touch display with In-Plane Switching technology and provides 1024x600 pixel resolution at 169 ppi with 16 million colors. In addition, it offers a battery life of upto 8 hours of continuous reading or 7.5 hours of video playback, with the wireless turned off.

The Kindle Fire could be an excellent alternative to the iPad for price-conscious consumers, and investors in Amazon will be hoping it paves a new path in the market for Android-based tablets, helping the company to second position (next only to Apple) in terms of market share, in the coming quarter.