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Evening Standard
Evening Standard
Technology
Rachael Davies

Amazon announces a flurry of new Echo and Kindle products

The new Echo Dot offers double the bass in the same compact size

(Picture: Amazon)

Updates are being introduced to Amazon products virtually across the board, with new models of Kindle, Echo Studio, Echo Dot, Fire TV, and Ring.

Breaking new ground, Amazon will launch the first Kindle for both reading and writing, offering the ability to add handwritten sticky notes onto books, PDFs, and journals.

While adding notes to books doesn’t seem overly helpful, being able to annotate PDFs could be a handy study or work tactic, with a Kindle being far more lightweight to work from on the go than a laptop or even some tablets.

The Kindle Scribe, complete with a battery-free pen, four-month Kindle Unlimited Subscription, and cloud storage, is available to pre-order now from £329.99.

Looking at the Echo range, it seems that Amazon is focusing on improving audio quality and capabilities across the board.

For what’s already the best speaker in the range, they’re introducing custom-built spatial audio-processing technology to Echo Studio. The upgrade is designed to enhance stereo sound, offering greater width, clarity, and presence.

On the smaller end of the Echo range, the Echo Dot and Echo Dot with Clock have had their speaker-capabilities boosted. The same compact size now offers double the bass for improved audio capabilities.

Children aren’t being left out either, with two new colourful designs for Echo Dot Kids, an owl and a dragon, starting from £64.99. Remember that, as with all Amazon’s kid-focused products, it comes with a free suite of parental controls, two-year worry-free guarantee, and one year of Amazon Kids+.

Sticking with the smart-home upgrades, Amazon’s Fire TV Cube is 20 per cent more powerful, now complete with an HDMI input port and Wi-Fi 6E support. You don’t need to scrabble for the remote with the Cube either, with hands-free controls via Alexa.

Plus, from November, Fire TV will be available to watch via Echo Show 15 devices for no extra cost, so you can watch TV from wherever you like in your home.

If you like an old-fashioned remote with modern tech includes, the Alexa Voice Remote Pro comes with a Remote Finder feature to make sure you never lose it again, as well as one-touch shortcuts to your favourite apps, content, and Alexa commands for faster control.

Finally, Amazon has released two new models of Ring Cams. The Spotlight Cam Pro offers a suite of security-focused settings, including 3D Motion Detection, Bird’s Eye View, Colour Pre-Roll, and Audio+, to offer a clear image of what’s outside your front door.

The Spotlight Cam Plus introduces a new, sleek look for the same camera functionality. There’s nothing too ground-breaking in the Plus, with the major change being multiple power options, including solar, battery, wired, and plug-in.

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