Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsNew Fire HD Plus Doesn't Like SD cards!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 1 December 2021
For my needs the Fire 8 HD Plus should of been a pretty good choice... I do think it has a lot more competition out there at it's normal price point than it use too so you might think differently, especially with it's limitations, problems and being heavily tied to Amazon's ecosystem. With that in mind I can only really recommend it when it's on sale or if you are a big user of Amazon services and can over look the potential problems that might affect your use of this device.
I ended up going for the Fire 8 HD Plus over the Fire 8 HD because it was more up to date and the extra RAM should make the user experience smoother. On paper it should of been a big step up from my old Fire 8 HD, in some ways it is, but in others it seems to be a step or two backwards.
I'm not too keen on the slightly wider size as it doesn't fit in my hand as well, but that is down to peoples preferences so I won't hold that against it. Otherwise I can't see that much real change on the outside, the camera is in a different place and so are the buttons, but a part from that there isn't much to set it apart from its older cousins.
As for it in use, there I do notice a difference, I get alerts and messages pop up as soon as I switch it on (Included screenshot so you can see for yourselves). It should feel snapper and more responsive with it's better CPU, RAM and Storage, but that's not always coming across in normal daily use as quite a few times I have noticed it slowing down a lot as if it was waiting on something in the back ground (Update has improved this).
The main problem is the SD card keeps throwing up alerts and reporting it's not working... I worked out it is actually working, takes sometime to show up after booting up though. I never had any problem with this SD card on my old Fire and it works in other devices without any problems. I tried all the fixes I was told to try when I contacted Amazon, none of them made any difference... Amazon technician was meant to get to get back to me, but that never happen for some reason, not great customer service Amazon!
Looking online it does seem to be a common problem, I did try all the other fixes other people had posted, but none helped me and it looks like quite a few people were in the same boat... In my opinion it seems to be a problem with the Fire OS more than the hardware, but it would be nice to be told.
Another strange problem is with taking screenshots, sometimes it reports it didn't work but I did find out that more often than not it has actually worked. I have included a screenshot of this weird behaviour too.
All these problems started on day one with a brand new Fire 8 HD Plus, as you can see from my screenshots there was plenty of free storage. The Fire only had the pre-installed apps and a completely empty SD card installed. The screenshot of the screenshot not working was taken with the Fire itself, LOL.
The SD card I was using was a SanDisk Ultra128GB Class 10, I tried other SD cards I had all suffered the same response. Samsung Pro 32 was one of the other cards so you can see it's not just one make or size.
After a lot of back and forwarding with Amazon technical/customer services and trying everything under the sun, I have been told it is a well known problem and a fix is being worked on and that a future update will solve the problem... When in the future no one could say. Fingers crossed it's not too long. I will report back if it does get fixed. With that in mind I would recommend all potential buyers leave of buying one until we know it will indeed be fixed.
