Basic Getting Started Tips1. Fire Tablets Help and Support Section – Here’s the help section at Amazon with all the for everything from getting started tips, quick fixes, initial setup, troubleshooting, setting up parental controls, how to use the accessibility features, and a lot more.2. User Guides – All the newer Fire tablets come with the user manuals built-in. To access the user guide, swipe down from the top of the screen and tap Help User Guide.
Help videos are accessible from there as well, along with a troubleshooting guide for common problems.3. Contact Amazon Support – The two tips above both provide options to contact Amazon support for assistance; you can even send an email directly from the Fire tablet’s help section. Beware of phony Amazon support numbers posted all over online.4. Remove Ads – After logging into your Amazon account, go to the section of your account.
From the actions list you can choose to 'Edit' the Special Offers field to unsubscribe from ads. It costs $15 plus tax.5. MicroSD Cards – The latest Fire tablets support up to 256GB in size.
Jun 18, 2017 The HD 8 now comes in a Kids Edition. Sarah Tew/CNET Like all of Amazon's latest Fire tablets, including the slightly improved entry-level Fire 7, you can access the Alexa voice assistant with a.
You can install apps on the memory card, and store Amazon music, videos, books, audiobooks and more on the memory card. See here for the.6. Check Available Storage Space – Go to Settings Storage.
From there you can choose to free up space by archiving Amazon content not recently used, and view what type of content is using the storage space to choose specific items to remove.7. Parental Controls – In the settings menu there’s an option for parental controls where you can setup a password to restrict purchasing content, using the web browser, accessing certain apps, blocking Alexa, and more. You can also setup child profiles and Household profiles to share content (#26).8. Password Protection – In Settings Security there’s an option to set a lock screen password so that other people cannot access your device.9.
Backup and Restore – You can backup all your device settings, installed apps and more from the settings menu under device options. Backups can be used to restore a factory reset tablet or even a new one. See here for more about.10. Change Name – You can change the name that appears in the upper left corner by going to Settings Device Options Change Your Device Name.
Fire OS 5 Tips and Tricks11. Install Google Play – All Fire tablets that run Fire OS 5.0 and up can have the Google Play Store installed easily in about 5 minutes, no hacking or rooting required. You just have to install four Google apps. See here for directions on.12. How to Take Screenshots – To capture screenshots press and hold the power button and the volume down button at the same time for 2 seconds.13. Adjust System Font Size – You can increase the font size for all the menus and items by going to Settings Display Font Size.14.
Blue Shade – From the quick settings menu you can turn the Blue Shade feature on and off to filter out blue light to help with night reading. Tap the notification to configure settings (or go to Settings Display Blue Shade) to fine tune brightness and color and set it to automatically turn on and off at specific times.15. Using Alexa – Amazon’s can be activated by holding the home button until a blue line appears. You can use Alexa to ask questions, shop at Amazon, run searches, play music, and more. Alexa can be turned off by going to Settings Device Options Alexa.16.
Adaptive Brightness – The Fire HD 8 has a feature called adaptive brightness that automatically adjusts the screen brightness based on the amount of ambient lighting. It can be very distracting but luckily it can be turned on and off in the Settings menu under Display.17. Homescreen Settings – Go to Settings Apps & Games Amazon Application Settings Home Screen Settings to turn on and off homescreen recommendations and new items appearing. You can choose to show apps on the recent page or not, and make it so scrolling is smoother on the homescreen.18. Print From Fire Tablet – If you have a wireless printer you can print from a Fire tablet. See here for more about.19.
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Install 3rd Party Android Apps – You can install apps that aren’t from the Amazon appstore by going to Settings Security and enabling 'Apps from Unknown sources'.20. Alternate Appstores – After enabling 3rd party apps as described above, you can install apps from anywhere you can get them.
Here’s a list on some or you can install Google Play (#11).21. Bluetooth Connect – Fire tablets don’t have a convenient way to turn Bluetooth on and off quickly but you can install an app like to make it as easy as tapping an app icon22.
Reboot – If your Fire tablet is ever experiencing problems, you’d be surprised how often a simple reboot fixes most issues.23. File Manager – Fire tablets don’t come with a good file management app and it can really help to have one. Luckily there are some at Amazon, some are free.24. Alternate Homescreen – You can install alternate homescreen launchers to get access to a more common Android-style homescreen. However, the home button doesn’t map to the new launcher so you have to use the app icon or recent apps list to get to the alternate homescreen, and widgets don’t work properly either.25. Change Wallpaper – Go to Settings Display Wallpaper to change the wallpaper. You can use custom images too.26.
Family Sharing and Child Profiles – You can create up to 4 child profiles on Fire tablets and choose what content is available for each. You can also setup Family Library sharing between two Amazon accounts to share ebooks to other content like apps, games, audiobooks, and Prime Instant Videos. See this article for details on.27. Find Your Tablet – Amazon offers a few options to help find a lost or stolen Fire tablet, including remote alarms and tracking.
You can also set a password or factory reset remotely. Here’s an article with.28. Second Screen – Unfortunately Fire tablets don’t have a way to stream or cast content on TVs, but there’s a that works in conjunction with Amazon TV devices to use the tablet as a remote and to use the X-ray for movies feature to learn more about the show.29. Turn Off App Notifications – Sometimes apps can get annoying with pestering notifications. Luckily there’s the option to turn off notifications for most apps in Settings Sound & Notifications App Notifications.
You can also setup times to mute all notifications, or select Do Not Disturb from the quick settings menu.30. PDF Reader Apps – If the Kindle’s PDF app isn’t cutting it, there are much better options out there. In the Amazon appstore there’s, which is free. Is one the best free apps for PDFs but it won’t install from the Amazon appstore.31. App unresponsive or not working properly – Apps can sometimes freeze up or start acting slow or unusual.
Re-starting the device will often make an app that is misbehaving start working again, but a quicker way is to force close the app. Go to Settings Apps & Games Manage All Applications Select App Force Stop. If that doesn’t work trying clearing cache and data as well. The last option would be to try uninstalling the app and then reinstalling it.32. Folders – You can create folders on the homescreen to group apps together simply by holding and dragging an app on top of another app. You can name the folder or leave it blank.33.
Battery Monitoring App – A good way to monitor battery usage and to see which apps are using the most power is with.34. Silk Web Reader – The Silk web browser has a feature that takes the content of a page and cleanly re-formats it. There are different text sizes and formatting options. Look for the book icon located on the web browser tab.
It only appears on article-type pages.35. Save Web Pages – With the Silk web browser you can save pages (like this one) for future reference and offline reading by hitting the menu button, then tapping the Reading List icon and selecting 'Save to Reading List'.36. Cloud Storage – In addition to, you can use other cloud storage options to easily save, stream, share, and move files. One popular options that works well with Fire tablets is. It’s not available in the Amazon appstore but the apk file can be emailed or texted from the link above.37.
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Uploading Music – You can upload your personal music collection to Amazon’s cloud drive and stream it or download it to your tablet. Here are the. The first 250 songs are free to upload.38.
Loading non-Amazon eBooks and Personal Documents – The fastest and easiest way to load non-Amazon ebooks and personal documents on to your Fire tablet is to use a or email them to the Kindle Fire’s free email address. The unique address can be found under Settings My Account, and can be modified from the Manage Your Devices page at Amazon.39. Select Text & Copy and Paste – When using the web browser and certain other apps, you can select and copy text by long-pressing on the word and then dragging the little arrows. To paste, long-press in any text entry field to bring up the option.
You can also long-press on links and images with the browser to bring up saving, sharing, and other options.40. Text to Speech Voices – You can change the voices that are used for the text-to-speech feature by going to Settings Keyboard and Language Text-to-Speech. Then make sure to turn on TTS from the reading settings menu using the Kindle app. More Fire Tablet Tips41. How to Read ePub eBooks – There are a number of ePub reading apps available in the Amazon appstore but Amazon hides most of them from appearing on Fire tablets, except for. It’s a good option for ePub books in addition to library books.42.
Access a Computer Remotely– You can access your computer and all the files and programs on it directly from your Kindle Fire with the.43. Fire Tablet Accessories – Here’s the page at Amazon for for each Fire tablet model.44.
Advanced Fire Tablet Guides – Head over to the XDA forums for some, everything from hacking to rooting and installing custom ROMS (more for previous generation models than newer ones).45. Free Whispersync for Voice Audiobooks – Each month Amazon gives away a free ebook and audiobook pair to promote their Whispersync for Voice feature that syncs ebooks and audiobooks together to switch back and forth between reading and listening. The freebie gets updated on the each month.46. Free Library eBooks – Fire tablets support getting library ebooks downloaded for free from local libraries. You can use the or install the.47. Free eMagazines – Many public libraries offer hundreds of popular digital magazines for free. The can be downloaded once sideloading the Zinio app and are totally free and have no return dates; you can even download back issues.48.
Free Android Apps – Amazon discontinued their underground appstore with the 7th gen tablets but you can still find plenty of.49. Free Kindle eBooks – Here are some good places to load up on free Kindle books:.50. Kindle eBook Deals – Here are some links to different sections at Amazon for Kindle ebooks:. FWIW, I’ve found the Amazon launcher less and less irritating the more that I’ve used it BUT there IS an alternative launcher that works very well and is (essentially) free.
It’s available in the Amazon store (and Google Play Store) called Smart Taskbar 2.What it does is place a translucent button on the screen – always available regardless of what app is active — that pops up a screen which has a customizable bar across the top (sort of like standard Android) and a scrollable list of all apps. It also allows customizable tabs through which you can groups apps by any means you wish.It works very, very well. It also works with other Android devices.
I’ve been a Kindle user for the past five or six years, although sometimes, it seems a lot longer. Part of that has to do with the fact that my very first Kindle was from the second generation — back when they still had an actual keyboard attached to them. After I upgraded to a Fire a few years ago, though, I began discovering a wide variety of, tricks, and tips that show exactly how versatile the device is. Sure, I still use it primarily for reading — but it’s capable of a whole lot more than just that.By “hacks,” of course, I mean it in the colloquial sense; they’re more like highlighting or settings you may not have realized exist.
The more advanced our technology gets, the more I realize how much I barely scratch the surface of what all of my devices can do — and the Kindle is no exception. So, I’m consciously making an attempt to broaden my horizons, since the worst thing we can do with all of the astonishing things we have at our fingertips is to become complacent about it all. While I’m at it, I figured I’d share my findings with you, Gentle Readers, since I’m sure at least some of you are in this wacky digital boat with me, too.Here are seven of my favorite little Kindle Fire tricks illustrated by cat GIFs, because there is nothing better than curling up with. View The Desktop Version Of A Website Instead Of The Mobile One.
The Kindle Fire’s default browser, Silk, automatically loads websites in mobile view (if a mobile view exists for that particular site). But while I don’t mind viewing mobile versions of sites on tiny screens like my phone, the Kindle’s screen is big enough that I’d really rather view full desktop versions on it. Luckily, it’s easy to do so: After you’ve loaded the mobile version of a page in Silk (this step is very important — you won't be able to pull off the rest of the trick if you just do it from the browser's home screen), tap the menu icon in the upper right — it looks like three dots stacked on top of each other.
Then, select “Request desktop site,” and the browser will go ahead and bring you to the full version of whichever site you were just looking at in mobile view. Easily Free Up Storage Space With A Single Tap. I know, I know; clearing up storage space on any device is tedious, no matter what it is.
At least the Kindle Fire’s OS has a nifty little feature that makes it relatively painless, though:, which identifies apps and services you haven’t used within the past seven days archives them with well, not exactly a single tap, but just a few of them, at least.To access it, just pull down the menu from the top of the screen and select “Settings”; then go into “Device Options,” then “Storage.” At the top of the menu, you’ll see “1-Tap Archive.” Tap it, and it’ll bring up a list of apps, books, and other files stored on your Kindle that you haven’t used in over a week. Each item will have a little box with a check next to it; tapping the box will uncheck it. Check the box on anything you want to archive, then hit the “Archive” button at the bottom of the screen. The items will be cleared from your device’s memory — but they’ll still be available in Cloud storage, so you can re-download them whenever you want. Clear Out Your Carousel. This one might seem like Basic Kindle Usage 101 — but I seriously didn’t know you could remove items from the home screen carousel on a Kindle Fire for literally the first two and a half years I owned one.
I also didn’t know you could close iPhone programs by double tapping the home button and then swiping up for oh maybe five years, so maybe this is just me; however, if there’s anyone else out there in my proverbial boat, this one’s for you.If there’s an item hanging out in your carousel, and you’ve decided that you no longer want it there, press it and hold down. A giant check mark should appear in the program’s icon, along with a little menu at the top of the screen. Tap “Remove,” then select “From Carousel.” Voila! That pesky program has been banished from sight, although not from the device entirely.Yes. The fact that I was not aware you could perform this action for so long is ridiculous. I’m comfortable in my ridiculousness.
Embrace The Power Of The Hard Reset. The Kindle Fire lets you set up multiple profiles — up to two adults and four children. They’re meant to make it easier to share one device with multiple people; everyone can have the home screen and whatnot set up the way they like, with the apps and books they use most often readily accessible and the others tucked away in the background. Don’t like seeing all of your apps laid on your home screen individually? Group ‘em into “Collections” to keep ‘em organized — they’re basically folders you can sort like apps into in order to keep your home screen clutter-free. If you haven’t, I suggest you do so immediately.
It’s hands down the best e-book library management software out there — and the best part is, it’s free! Not only can it help you organize your books — kind of like a virtual shelving system — but it can also convert files to e-reader-friendly formats, sync with your device, and more.
I actually resisted using yet another piece of software to manage my Kindle library for ages and when I finally did download it, I was kicking myself for not doing it sooner.I find it particularly useful for converting books downloaded from other sources, like (hi there, loads and loads of free reading material in the public domain!) or, into something manageable for my device — I’ve found that even if it’s in MOBI format, books not downloaded directly from Amazon tend to get shunted into the “Documents” section of my Kindle, rather than deposited in the “Books” section. Loading the file into Calibre, highlighting it, selecting “Convert Books,” going to “MOBI Output,” getting rid of the “DOC” tag in the “Personal Doc tag” field, and then finally selecting “OK” solves the problem — once it’s been re-converted, the DOC tag will be gone, allowing the book to appear in the “Books” section of your device.Images:; (7).