Amazon.com Inc. unveiled a slew of new Kindle Fire devices and an e-reader called Paperwhite on Thursday at an event in Santa Monica, Calif. The new gadgets range from $119 to $499. It's Amazon's latest effort to compete with Apple's iPad, the No. 1 tablet. Here's a look at some of the interesting new features for the gadgets:
- "Immersion Reading," where Kindle books can be synchronized with Audible audiobooks. It lets you read and listen at the same time.
- "X-Ray for Movies" on the Kindle Fire HD, where users can tap the screen at any time while watching a movie to find out who the actor is. The feature uses the Amazon-owned IMDb database service to find the information.
- "X-Ray for Books" and textbooks, which lets you tap a page in a book to find out more information on characters, places in a book or related YouTube content.
- "Whispersync for Games," lets you pick up where you left off when playing games. There's also Whispersync for movies and books.
- "Time to Read" uses your reading speed to tell you when you will finish a chapter in a book on the Paperwhite.
- "Kindle FreeTime" lets parents create profiles for their children and choose what books, games, apps or videos they can access. They will also be able to set time limits. The feature will be available next month on each version of the Kindle Fire HD.