Top 8 Best Buy Tablets of 2012
Amazon announced its Kindle Fire HD tablets on 6 September. Amazon

Amazon recently announced two new Kindle Fire tablets - a 7in and an 8.9in (both HD) and an update to the original 7in Fire.

Check out how the 7in Fire HD does against Samsung's Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus, which was released in October...

Display

The Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus has a 7in PLS LCD capacitive touch-screen with the TouchWiz UX User Interface (UI) and 4-way rotation technology. The resolution of the display is 600 x 1024 pixels and it has a pixel density of 170 pixels per inch (ppi).

The 7in Fire HD features a 7in IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen protected with Corning Gorilla Glass. The resolution of the display is 800 x 1280 pixels with a pixel density of 216 ppi. The display also features an advanced polarising filter and anti-glare technology.

Dimensions

The Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus measures 193.7 x 122.4 x 9.96mm, which is almost identical to the 7in Fire HD's 193 x 137 x 10 mm stats. However, Samsung's 7in tablet is approximately 50g lighter than Amazon's 345g tablet.

Operating System

The 7in Fire HD will run on Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS)). The Galaxy Tab was launched with Android 3.2 (Honey Comb) but has been upgraded to ICS.

Processor

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus is powered by an Exynos 4 dual-core processor with a Mali-400MP graphics unit. The processor runs at a clock speed of 1.2GHz. The Kindle Fire HD is powered by a Texas Instrument (TI) OMAP 4460 dual-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz. Both tablets pack 1GB of RAM.

Camera

The Samsung Galaxy Tab, like other 7in tablets in the family, packs a three megapixel rear-facing camera with standard technologies like auto-focus, LED flash, geo-tagging and smile detection. The camera can record videos in 720p at 30 frames per second (fps) and has a two megapixel front-facing camera. The Kindle Fire HD has a front-facing HD camera with a custom Skype app for video calls. However, it does not have a rear-facing camera.

Storage

Both devices offer two models - with 16GB and 32GB of space. However, the Galaxy Tab offers support for a microSD card, whereas the Kindle Fire has access to free cloud storage for Amazon products and services.

Connectivity

The Samsung Galaxy Tab offers Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, DLNA, Wi-Fi Direct, dual-band,Wi-Fi hotspot and Bluetooth v3.0 with A2DP and HS. It supports data speed up to HSDPA 21 Mbps and HSUPA 5.76 Mbps.

The Kindle Fire HD will offer dual-band and dual-antenna Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g/n) in addition to Bluetooth. More importantly, Amazon's tablet will feature MIMO (Multiple In/Multiple Out - a technology designed to combat problems with line of sight for wireless signals) which is supposed to offer up to 40 percent faster speeds. Amazon also claims the Kindle Fire HD tablets are the first to offer all three wireless technologies - dual-band, dual-antennas and MIMO.

Battery

The Samsung Galaxy Tab is powered by a Li-ion 4000mAh battery. Amazon has yet to clarify battery size for the Fire HD but has stated users can expect 11 hours of continuous use. Engadget has clarified the battery offers up to nine hours and 57 minutes of use

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