775
people found this helpful, as of 2023
ranked #16,782 most helpful
out of 571,544,897 reviews
★☆☆☆☆
Tablet let down by FreeTimr
I really want to like my kids new Fire 10 tablets, but the Amazon Free Time platform has some key broken features and defects that I'd like to see address, please forward to the appropriate team if possible.
Key feature - Learn first: Block entertainment content until all daily educational goals are met. Does not work! I simply want my kids to read for 15 minutes before watching any videos. Amazon deems certain videos as educational (not entertainment) and thus allows videos to be watched without reading, the kids go straight for these. The only work around is to block all videos, so now my kids can't watch any videos.
You can't easily tell whats already on your tablet unless you're on the home screen. Downloading books and apps can take time and why not precache more books? (they are small file size) Please make it very clear in the user interface as to whats local and what needs to be downloaded. This is related to the offline/online comment in other reviews.
The interface is optimized for a small tablet or phone, not a 10 inch HD display, I expected better UI rather than supersized app icons. Pinning apps to home screen means you have to scroll due to the oversized carosel.
The home screen inconsistently shows content that's unavailable. Unavailable due to already exceeding time limits still shows, but content that's blocked because educational goals have not been met is hidden. I think it should all be hidden, or clearly shows why it is blocked, so the kid does not tap it and waste time on the yellow screen (saying they don't have access).
You can set different schedules for the week days and weekend, but in reality I'm going to let my kids do more things on a Friday night and stay up later, in my mind this is of our weekend. Sunday night is a school night. Schedules by individual day would be much better...
After restart the tablet is fast, it then slows down the more you use it. I suspect they are leaving applications running in the background, this consumes memory and slows the tablet, until reboot. Resource management and closing background apps needs to be done more aggressively to keep the tablet running fast.
You can't do basic customization to the UI like changing backgrounds or home screen for the Child. This has been known for many years and not addressed, do they have kids testing these tablets? Why not help them make it their own with some simple UI tweaks that regular users of the SAME tablet *non freetime* can do?
These are all first hand experiences, discovered within one week of use. Fix these and its a great product at a reasonable price!
August 2018 · Unknown · verified purchase