Kindle Fire HD 7" Wi-Fi Tablets

After 2 years of faithful service and withstanding MANY drops, our ipad finally gave out on us so we had to get a replacement to help me juggle caring for our son during the day with a work-from-home job. We like for him to have fun but also educational apps, games, and videos. But we're also on a budget so after looking at all the options, we decided on this one - with the special offers because it was cheaper and reviewers said what great deals they found through those offers on things they would have bought anyway. Here are the pros and cons as I've experienced them: PROS: - smaller and lighter weight than Ipad so easier for my son to handle. We got a Bobj non-toxic silicone cover/case for this model to protect it from future drops during tantrums...we've already had a couple and it's been protected. (while it had slight smell when we first received like all of these products, went away quickly...the materials still seemed safer than Amazon's version and came in black color) - general functionality is pretty good...nothing to write home about, and in my opinion, a lot less intuitive than the Ipad, You can figure things out fairly quickly for most things, but I had a couple functions stump me for several minutes. - reasonable cost, especially with the special offer model. While I haven't had any super deals come across that i would take advantage of, the ads are easily ignored and haven't come across anything offensive, so if i had to do over again, I'd still get the special offer version CONS: - first one we got was defective...lit up slightly but nothing ever appeared on screen. After email and 2 phone calls to their tech support to "troubleshoot," Amazon finally agreed to send me out a replacement after pretty much confirming the same thing I originally told them....only difference was I was on the phone with their rep and had the unit in front of me. Didn't require me to do anything with it...right away it was, ok, yes, that's defective, we'll get you out a new one. I understand they might deal with a lot of "user error" and these things are expensive, but still frustrating that I wasted a lot of time for nothing. - second one worked ok, but I'm finding that I need to get used to the slowness of this unit. With Ipad, I touched something (a button or something on the screen) and it INSTANTLY responded. You don't have that here with the Fire...response is delayed by at least a few to several seconds...enough to where I start thinking maybe I have to push it again. Also it's easy for my son to accidentally push the power button in the back, which causes the screen to go black and then I have to turn it back on for him again. - the apps...I could find very few apps for my son that were genuinely free...there are some (if you're a Christian) like the Bible App for Kids by YouVersion/OneHope that are interactive, fun, and free...but in general, I was disappointed that most apps had like 1 out of 10 games free, and you were constantly being bombarded with messages to buy the full version. Of course my son will want to play the other 9, but I get it, they have to make money some how. I found a couple for $1.99 each that entertain and teach him so went with those. Frustrated that I can't get the same kind of quality apps (Jigsaw puzzle app for example) with this unit than I could get with the Ipad. Also frustrated with the amount of time taking me to evaluate and delete/buy apps individually, I decided to take a chance on the Freetime Unlimited subscription...since Amazon advertises it as a "safe" environment with complete parental control and first month trial is free, I thought why not, seems great and will probably save me time of getting him out of stuff he's not supposed to be in or getting frustrated with. - the FreeTime Unlimited subscription...in theory OUTSTANDING to have all these options available in one place for kids and the concept again to have a kid-safe environment is great. Cost is reasonable. However, while you CAN control the content you've already paid for outside of Unlimited with parental controls and add the Unlimited titles you want to the "carousel" on the main page of your child's profile, you CANNOT select which Unlimited titles show up on the Books tab for example (and it's just 1 easy click away for the child to get there). There are many books (as well as videos, etc) in the Unlimited subscription I don't want my 3-year-old accessing as they seem for an older audience and I'm not sure why Amazon includes them in the 3-5 year old category I selected with the subscription. In case I was missing something, I posted a question in the help forum and an Amazon rep responded confirming there's no way to remove those titles (even if you "remove from device" in the carousel, they remain on the tab), and advised me to provide feedback to their product team. This is ridiculous. What good is having a "safe" environment for kids if you can't edit all the provided content further if you feel some of it's "unsafe"? Who decided that it's ok my 3 year old be exposed to books with grotesque life-like pictures on ghosts, monsters, etc?? This is what Amazon feels is "safe"?? I have a HUGE problem with that, and as a result, will have to cancel our membership if our son starts clicking on that tab at all. Sorry, but not all parents are ok with exposing their kids to horror movies at 3 years old...the world's full of enough ugliness as it is. Also, while it won't result in terrifying or disturbing my son, I don't believe it's appropriate - if you don't have the ability to remove Unlimited content from the tabs - to include religious books...I noticed a book on a Jewish holiday and we're not Jewish. Didn't really see any others, but point being it should be up to the parent to decide which religious beliefs to expose the child to and when. If parents are trusting Amazon's "safe" advertising, they might not even notice these things until they're children are already pulling these things up. If other parents feel the same way, I'd HIGHLY suggest they write to kindle-fire-feedback@amazon.com and let them know. - Also in Unlimited, things seem to freeze or not pull up immediately frequently which frustrates my son and defeats the purpose for me to be able to focus on something while he's next to me learning or being entertained. - battery life doesn't last nearly as long as Ipad and takes longer to charge as well Overall, I think it will take a lot more time for my son and I to get used to this and find apps/things to do that will achieve the purpose for which we bought it, but I hope we'll get there. If we had the money, I would be returning this and getting another Ipad or a higher quality unit by a different brand.