Monday Amazon Deals: SF Kindle books, Kinde Fire HDX, $1.99 DVDs, Sewing Machines, more!

(Most of yesterday's deals, including House, Samurai Champloo and other anime, the Roku 3, the Warner/holiday/Peanuts sets, and more, are still active.)

The Deal of the Day offers 50% Off Kindle Fire HDX 4G LTE Tablets, putting them in the $139-174 range. Note that this is the 3rd generation, not the current (4th) one, but it's still a damned fine deal.

Another DotD offers the Sennheiser RS120 On-Ear Wireless RF Headphones with Charging Dock for $59.99 (53% off, about $30 off other sellers), while a third DotD offers assorted Logitech Harmony Remote Controls and Home Controls for 25-38% off (all well below other dealers). I can't hear that name without thinking of eHarmony, though.

Yet another Deal of the Day is on "Giftable Toys," by which they mean "toys." There are about 70 choices at 50% off, incuding lots of Crayola, Fisher Price, PlayMobil, Elenco, Thomas the Train, and other good stuff for younger kids.

And a Kindle Daily Deal offers a bunch of First Volumes in Genre Series for $1.99 each. Authors include Octavia Butler, Barbara Hambly, Dave Duncan, Timothy Zahn, Samuel Delany, Kate Elliott, John DeChancie, and more.

Also in Kindle, if you "buy" the free ebook of A Christmas Carol, Amazon will then offer you the audiobook, read by Tim Curry, for $.99.

In other deals, there's a big $1.99 DVD sale, with about three dozen movies, including Inside Man, Man on Fire, Ferngully, Grumpy Old Men, Dawn of the Dead (the remake), Bad Lieutenant (the original) and more. Note that because of the way Amazon's search works, it'll imply there's hundreds of choices, but they'll peter out after page three.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is $3.99 (80% off) for the Blu-Ray/DVD/Digital edition.

In video games, Skyrim Legendary Edition for the PC is $14.99 (50% off).

Persona 4 Arena: Ultimax for the PS3 is $29.99 (50% off).

And the PlayStation 4 Camera is $39.99 (33% off).

In magazines, the $6 Wired subscription with the digital and print editions and a $5 Amazon credit is back. That's a kind of ridiculous offer.

And finally, for the crafty people, the Brother XL2600I Sew Advance Sew Affordable 25-Stitch Free-Arm Sewing Machine is $69.97 (53% off, about $35 below others after shipping), and the Brother CS6000i Feature-Rich Sewing Machine With 60 Built-In Stitches, 7 styles of 1-Step Auto-Size Buttonholes, Quilting Table, and Hard Cover is $143.99 (68% off, about $32 below other deals). If you prefer Singer, the Singer 7256 Fashion Mate 70-Stitch Computerized Free-Arm Sewing Machine with Automatic Needle Threader is $119 (54% off, $20 below other choices). Oh, and in other brands and awkward typos, the Sunbeam Sewing Machine Compact "Sawing" Machine is $69.99 (42% off, $10 off other deals). I'm not sure if that's meant to fix or destroy your clothes.

Monday Amazon Deals: SF Kindle books, Kinde Fire HDX, $1.99 DVDs, Sewing Machines, more!

(Most of yesterday's deals, including House, Samurai Champloo and other anime, the Roku 3, the Warner/holiday/Peanuts sets, and more, are still active.)

The Deal of the Day offers 50% Off Kindle Fire HDX 4G LTE Tablets, putting them in the $139-174 range. Note that this is the 3rd generation, not the current (4th) one, but it's still a damned fine deal.

Another DotD offers the Sennheiser RS120 On-Ear Wireless RF Headphones with Charging Dock for $59.99 (53% off, about $30 off other sellers), while a third DotD offers assorted Logitech Harmony Remote Controls and Home Controls for 25-38% off (all well below other dealers). I can't hear that name without thinking of eHarmony, though.

Yet another Deal of the Day is on "Giftable Toys," by which they mean "toys." There are about 70 choices at 50% off, incuding lots of Crayola, Fisher Price, PlayMobil, Elenco, Thomas the Train, and other good stuff for younger kids.

And a Kindle Daily Deal offers a bunch of First Volumes in Genre Series for $1.99 each. Authors include Octavia Butler, Barbara Hambly, Dave Duncan, Timothy Zahn, Samuel Delany, Kate Elliott, John DeChancie, and more.

Also in Kindle, if you "buy" the free ebook of A Christmas Carol, Amazon will then offer you the audiobook, read by Tim Curry, for $.99.

In other deals, there's a big $1.99 DVD sale, with about three dozen movies, including Inside Man, Man on Fire, Ferngully, Grumpy Old Men, Dawn of the Dead (the remake), Bad Lieutenant (the original) and more. Note that because of the way Amazon's search works, it'll imply there's hundreds of choices, but they'll peter out after page three.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is $3.99 (80% off) for the Blu-Ray/DVD/Digital edition.

In video games, Skyrim Legendary Edition for the PC is $14.99 (50% off).

Persona 4 Arena: Ultimax for the PS3 is $29.99 (50% off).

And the PlayStation 4 Camera is $39.99 (33% off).

In magazines, the $6 Wired subscription with the digital and print editions and a $5 Amazon credit is back. That's a kind of ridiculous offer.

And finally, for the crafty people, the Brother XL2600I Sew Advance Sew Affordable 25-Stitch Free-Arm Sewing Machine is $69.97 (53% off, about $35 below others after shipping), and the Brother CS6000i Feature-Rich Sewing Machine With 60 Built-In Stitches, 7 styles of 1-Step Auto-Size Buttonholes, Quilting Table, and Hard Cover is $143.99 (68% off, about $32 below other deals). If you prefer Singer, the Singer 7256 Fashion Mate 70-Stitch Computerized Free-Arm Sewing Machine with Automatic Needle Threader is $119 (54% off, $20 below other choices). Oh, and in other brands and awkward typos, the Sunbeam Sewing Machine Compact "Sawing" Machine is $69.99 (42% off, $10 off other deals). I'm not sure if that's meant to fix or destroy your clothes.

Android: Initial impressions

Screen/touch: The screen is sharp as anything, but the responsiveness is fascinatingly off. It's fine for keyboard and other inputs, but for action games, it's amazing how much weaker this is compared to even a first-gen iPad. I tried playing Spider-Man Unlimited, a perfectly fun (non-endless) runner which I'd had to nuke from my iPad for space reasons. On the Galaxy Tab, the responsiveness was off by maybe a half second or so, and occasionally didn't react at all. In addition, the fact that swipes could often bring up "helpful" windows from above or the right was an interface issue. Probably fixable in settings, but a pain. I saw similar problems with Adventure Time Jumping Finn Turbo, although the responsiveness was less of a factor given the gameplay. In a less action-oriented game like Plague, Inc (where only the occasional "click on a DNA point" action requires reflexes), it's not as big a deal, and likewise in something like Ascension or in productivity apps. Interestingly, I don't notice the delay when typing (either traditionally or by swiping). But I'm generally surprised at the difference here. Not sure if it's the glass, or the OS, or if it matters.

Obviously, I'm still getting used to the Android interface, but it's generally intuitive enough to shift from it to iOS and back again for most stuff. I still double-click on the home button to try to bring up the task manager/app switcher half the time, but I'll get used to that in time. Some of the Samsung bloatware (the forced Galaxy Apps store on one page) is annoying, but I can't blame Android for that.

In terms of accessibility stuff, the zoom on Android seems as solid as the iOS one, so it's likely in the running on the low-vision or high-focus front. The text-to-speech is nice, although the voices aren't quite as good as Apple's. But it seems fine for folks who might want to have text read aloud (although the Android release of Voice Dream Reader will be the big moment here; it's the best reading app on iOS hands down). More important is the ability to use audio to navigate the system, and until I feel like I've got a grasp on the overall Android navigation, I don't know if I'll really be able to judge how well it'll work for blind users (I've spent enough time learning commands on the iOS to at least have a sense of that system). Of course, iOS is so heavily entrenched with the blind community that I suspect it may not matter a whole lot.

I also need to dive more into gesture control (which, especially with text-to-speech activated, is different on iOS and Android; I get that we're talking different UI teams, but man would standardization be nice every once in a while when there's a common good) and voice control. That's not something on the immediate slate, though.

I also find Google's choice to mess with support for external storage to be a little annoying, especially since that's always been one of the things Android folks threw out as a reason iOS was inferior; putting a microSD card in that can only be accessed by some apps seems a touch silly.

Apps I've installed that I'll actually use (games don't count, because they're first to go): Evernote, Wunderlist, AndroZip, assorted readers (Kindle, PerfectViewer, etc), the assorted Google suite of stuff (including Google Keyboard, which I quite like so far). Since it's a tablet and not a phone, things built around a 4G connection like maps and the like aren't really on my plate.

Anyway, I'm still early in my adventures with the tablet. If nothing else, it's nice to have something that fits in one hand (I know the iPad mini is a thing, but I've never had a tablet this small).

Android: Initial impressions

Screen/touch: The screen is sharp as anything, but the responsiveness is fascinatingly off. It's fine for keyboard and other inputs, but for action games, it's amazing how much weaker this is compared to even a first-gen iPad. I tried playing Spider-Man Unlimited, a perfectly fun (non-endless) runner which I'd had to nuke from my iPad for space reasons. On the Galaxy Tab, the responsiveness was off by maybe a half second or so, and occasionally didn't react at all. In addition, the fact that swipes could often bring up "helpful" windows from above or the right was an interface issue. Probably fixable in settings, but a pain. I saw similar problems with Adventure Time Jumping Finn Turbo, although the responsiveness was less of a factor given the gameplay. In a less action-oriented game like Plague, Inc (where only the occasional "click on a DNA point" action requires reflexes), it's not as big a deal, and likewise in something like Ascension or in productivity apps. Interestingly, I don't notice the delay when typing (either traditionally or by swiping). But I'm generally surprised at the difference here. Not sure if it's the glass, or the OS, or if it matters.

Obviously, I'm still getting used to the Android interface, but it's generally intuitive enough to shift from it to iOS and back again for most stuff. I still double-click on the home button to try to bring up the task manager/app switcher half the time, but I'll get used to that in time. Some of the Samsung bloatware (the forced Galaxy Apps store on one page) is annoying, but I can't blame Android for that.

In terms of accessibility stuff, the zoom on Android seems as solid as the iOS one, so it's likely in the running on the low-vision or high-focus front. The text-to-speech is nice, although the voices aren't quite as good as Apple's. But it seems fine for folks who might want to have text read aloud (although the Android release of Voice Dream Reader will be the big moment here; it's the best reading app on iOS hands down). More important is the ability to use audio to navigate the system, and until I feel like I've got a grasp on the overall Android navigation, I don't know if I'll really be able to judge how well it'll work for blind users (I've spent enough time learning commands on the iOS to at least have a sense of that system). Of course, iOS is so heavily entrenched with the blind community that I suspect it may not matter a whole lot.

I also need to dive more into gesture control (which, especially with text-to-speech activated, is different on iOS and Android; I get that we're talking different UI teams, but man would standardization be nice every once in a while when there's a common good) and voice control. That's not something on the immediate slate, though.

I also find Google's choice to mess with support for external storage to be a little annoying, especially since that's always been one of the things Android folks threw out as a reason iOS was inferior; putting a microSD card in that can only be accessed by some apps seems a touch silly.

Apps I've installed that I'll actually use (games don't count, because they're first to go): Evernote, Wunderlist, AndroZip, assorted readers (Kindle, PerfectViewer, etc), the assorted Google suite of stuff (including Google Keyboard, which I quite like so far). Since it's a tablet and not a phone, things built around a 4G connection like maps and the like aren't really on my plate.

Anyway, I'm still early in my adventures with the tablet. If nothing else, it's nice to have something that fits in one hand (I know the iPad mini is a thing, but I've never had a tablet this small).