Once upon a time you could play Scrabble, do crossword puzzles, and run other third-party apps and games on Amazon Kindle eReaders. But Amazon stopped offering the feature in 2014 when the company launched the Kindle Voyage. Every new model since then has lacked support for so-called “Kindle Active Content.” Still, if you had an […]
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Amazon launches Prime Video Watch Party: watch and chat with up to 100 distant friends
With the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping the globe, it can be tough (and maybe even illegal) to arrange group activities with a bunch of friends in person. But folks have been finding ways to arrange unofficial Zoom Karaoke, and Netflix Party activities. And recently some content providers have gotten in on the action, launching official tools […]
Lilbits 6-28-2020: Hacking the PS2, updating Windows, and unboxing the OneGX1
Twenty years after the PlayStation 2 was released, folks are still finding new things to do with the aging game console. While hackers have found a number of ways to run homebrew code (like unsupported games) on the PS2 over the years, most have involved things like mod chips or memory cards set up to […]
Lilbits 6-23-2020: The ARMs race is on
This week Apple confirmed that it’s preparing to transition from Intel to ARM chips for upcoming Mac computers, and the upcoming macOS Big Sur will be the company’s first desktop operating system designed for Apple Silicon chips based on ARM architecture. Befitting a move so big, it’ll also be the first version of the Mac […]
Amazon will end support for Dash Wand devices July 21st (effectively bricking them)
The Amazon Dash Wand is a small stick designed to make ordering (or re-ordering) products from Amazon simpler. Wave the device’s built-in scanner over barcodes of products in your home and it can re-order those items from Amazon. A few years ago Amazon launched a version of the Dash Wand with built-in support for the […]
Amazon Kindle updates: new colors and more storage (maybe)
This month Amazon added two new color options for the Kindle Paperwhite: in addition to buying the company’s 6 inch eReader with a high-resolution display in black or blue, you can now get sage or plum color options. But that might not be the only change in the Kindle lineup. Some customers who purchase the […]
Amazon Fire HD 8 (2020): How to disable Amazon apps and features
So you’ve installed the Google Play Store on Amazon’s Fire HD 8 (2020) tablet. What’s next? While you can’t yet root the tablet or replace the operating system with a custom ROM, you can disable a bunch of Amazon apps and features. Don’t need the Amazon Appstore, want to disable the Weather, Prime Video, or Kindle […]
How to install Google Play on the Amazon Fire HD 8 (2020)
Amazon’s Fire tablets offer some decent bang for the buck — they’re inexpensive devices with decent displays and reasonably good performance. But while the tablets run an Android-based operating system called Fire OS, they don’t come with the Google Play Store or popular Google apps like Gmail, YouTube, or Google Maps. But it’s pretty easy […]
Lilbits 5-29-2020: Amazon Echo Look stops looking this summer, editing audio in the cloud, and more
2 Comments on Lilbits 5-29-2020: Amazon Echo Look stops looking this summer, editing audio in the cloud, and more Another day, another “smart” gadget that’s about to become dumb. This time it’s Amazon’s Echo Look, an Alexa-enabled device that the company positioned as a “style assistant” when it first launched three years ago. This summer, it’ll stop giving fashion advice as Amazon kills off its Echo Look app and service, leaving customers with a […]
Amazon Fire HD 8 (2020) tablets feature MT8168 processor, Fire OS 7 software
When Amazon introduced the 10th-gen Fire HD 8 tablet series last week, the company revealed that the new tablets would have a faster processor, more RAM, faster WiFi, USB Type-C, and a new Fire HD 8 Plus model with 50-percent more RAM and support for wireless charging. But there were a few key specs that […]
