Google Apps on Kindle Fire HDX
Nate over at The Digital Reader had a post about installing Google apps on the new Kindle Fire HDX. Since I use GMail and other Google stuff and have the new Kindle Fire HDX, I figured ‘why not’. Turns out there is a basic reason – not all services work correctly and there are no notifications.
As a result, my only recommendation is ‘just say no’.
The method to installing everything comes in four steps:
• Google Account Manager
• Google Play Services
• Google Service Framework
• Gmail
You add one, reboot the Fire the install the next, and so on. One final reboot and you should be all set.
Only when you try to actually DO anything the Google Service Framework complains, Google Account Manager complains as well … and when you eventually get GMail running you will realize there are no notifications and the app will just sit there until you manually refresh your inbox.
Supposedly some apps work, but from what I have found you are better off just using the preinstalled email app since it handled GMail accounts quite well without errors and with instant notifications.
For many of the services, they will not work until the Kindle Fire HDX is rooted, which will then likely mess with other features of the tablet. So once again, for now my advice is to not even bother trying.
Michael,
I’m not too familiar with the Kindle Fire series of tablets. Has the Google Play store always been inaccessible? It seems as though Amazon is limiting the Fire’s appeal by locking it into its own ecosystem as opposed to allowing free reign as with other Android tablets.
Yes, the Kindle Fire line has always been separate from the Google ecosystem. Amazon maintains their own App Store and ecosystem, and the only option around that is to hack the tablet.
Sent from my iPad
Exactly what Carly said – if you look at the processes running on the Kindle Fire, there are loads of com.amazon.xxx things going on as well as com.android.xx stuff. I think that adding in all of that invasive Google framework stuff is just too much.
And honestly, people love to talk about how Amazon is ‘limiting the Fire’s appeal’ … but what is the #2 selling tablet? Kindle Fire.
Michael,
I was being somewhat ironic in mentioning the “limitations” in creating a private ecosystem within Android. It is curious that Amazon has been so successful with the Kindle Fire line despite eschewing Android’s ethos of end-user customizability as a significant strength. I don’t think success is simply a matter of price-point. I think that most average users of tech prefer a curated experience over the “wild west” that used to be the Google app store. However, Amazon’s success with the e-reader market and the online shopping market in general helps significantly as well.
Michael,
I am curious where you found the data about the Kindle Fire being the #2 selling tablet. From everything I have read about tablet “sales” (since they really only look at shipments per quarter), Samsung still is in a solid second place (obviously, however, they are referring to the entire spectrum of Galaxy tablets, not to a single model). I haven’t seen data that stratifies sales per individual model of tablet; rather, the data seem to be drawn from manufacturers as a whole.
It was more specific to the US market …
And I know I am always critical of Samsung (at least since the late 80s since their gov’t supported memory dumping trashed the US companies making memory chips and people I know lost their jobs) … but the way they handle tablet numbers is just atrocious.
Everything dates back to the original Galaxy Tab, where their first year someone estimated 2 million, whereas someone else said it was <200k with heavy returns. The next quarter Samsung went to % increase, and everyone stuck with that 2 million number, so now we have no clue what they are actually selling because it is all based on %s that are calculated from WAGS from 3 years ago! 🙂
Samsung’s government?
Are you talking about South Korea?
Awkward phrase but clear enough “their gov’t supported ” – meaning that the action that followed had complicit support from the government.
Hi Michael I want to ask if this method would be a way of getting purchased apps and games from Google’s Play Store over to the Kindle Fire HDX?
The method doesn’t go that far, and given the flaws already happening I never tried.