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Casey Johnston - Sep 18, 2014 1:00 am UTC

Amazon announced a slate of new Kindle products late Wednesday, including two new e-readers, a handful of new tablets, and a new version of its Android-based Fire operating system. Among the products are the new, ultra-thin Kindle Voyage e-reader and a new version of the 8.9-inch Fire HDX tablet, which now has an optional keyboard reminiscent of the Microsoft Surface.

The Kindle Voyage is designed to be Amazon's new high-end Kindle model at 7.6 millimeters thick with a magnesium metal back. The Voyage has a 300ppi Paperwhite display that is 39 percent brighter than the previous model. The screen is front-lit and adaptive, so not only can it adjust to the ambient light in the room, Amazon says it will also perform a gradual adjustment over the course of 30 minutes to compensate for the adjustment of readers' eyes to the display in that environment.

The Voyage also slightly revamps the controls: instead of the page-turning buttons used in older Kindles, the Voyage has pressure-sensitive pads with haptic feedback on either side of the screen that are meant to be quieter. The screen in the Voyage is a single piece of glass flush with the bezel that is micro-etched to minimize reflections and mimic the feeling of paper, according to Amazon.

Amazon also gave a slight refresh to its lowest-end Kindle, which will now have a touch screen, a new processor, and 4GB of storage instead of the 2GB in its predecessor.

All of the Kindle models will receive a software upgrade with several new features, including WordWise, a setting that can flow plain-English word definitions in with a book's text to help new and learning readers, with a slide to adjust the vocabulary level. A new setting in the Kindle X-ray interface uses "machine learning" to present summary timelines of the book's events and characters, meant to help readers pick up with the story after time away from reading it, according to Amazon. All Kindle models will get 6 to 8 weeks of use on their batteries depending upon usage, Amazon said.

The lowest-end Kindle will now be priced at $79, up from $69, with the Kindle Paperwhite at $119 and the Kindle Voyage at $199 for the Wifi version or $269 for the WAN version (all prices are with Special Offers ads enabled on the devices; those without cost $20 more). Both the Kindle and Kindle Voyage opened for pre-orders Wednesday and will begin shipping in October.

Amazon is releasing an updated model of its 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HDX tablet, the first edition of which was released last fall. The new model uses a 2.5GHz Snapdragon 805 quad-core processor but retains the 2560x1600 339ppi display.

The new Fire HDX will gain Dolby Atmos audio, which Amazon claims is twice as loud as the iPad Air and uses a dedicated chip that can optimize the speaker for volume without distortion. The battery life of the HDX is still slated to be 12 hours of reading, Internet browsing, or video viewing. Among the software improvements the HDX will get is Dynamic Light Control, which reads the brightness and temperature of ambient light and adjusts the display accordingly (though in our experience, the effect looks not unlike a dimmed display set to the sepia color scheme available across all Kindle apps).

Amazon is also introducing a Fire Keyboard accessory that is 4.8 millimeters thin and weighs 7 ounces to go with the HDX. The look and feel of the keyboard, from the key travel to the tiny trackpad, is very reminiscent of the Type Cover for the Microsoft Surface. The Fire Keyboard does not physically attach in any way to the HDX, and connects via Bluetooth. The cover can be attached via magnets to the inside of the HDX's origami case (sold separately) to fold the two pieces together into one unit.

Amazon also announced two new versions of the Kindle Fire HD, which come and 6- and 7-inch sizes and retain the 1280x800 screen resolutions. Both versions will now have front- and rear-facing 1080p HD cameras, 1.5GHz quad-core processors, and are available in five colors.

Along with the new Fire tablets comes a new version of Amazon's "Fire OS," dubbed 4.0 "Sangria." Sangria is based on Android 4.4 KitKat and has little more than user-experience refinements. These include ASAP (Advanced Streaming and Prediction), which pre-loads content that Amazon predicts the user will play, as well as Smart Suspend, which detects when the tablet is not in use and turns off the Wi-Fi to save battery. The new version of the OS will ship on all 4th-generation Fire tablets and will be available to 3rd-generation tablets as a free over-the-air software update.

The 6-inch Kindle HD will be priced at $99 and the 7-inch at $139, while the 8.9-inch HDX will be $379 for the Wi-Fi version of $479 for a 4G version. All versions will be available for pre-order starting Wednesday and set to ship in October. The Fire Keyboard accessory will retail for $59.99. Amazon will continue to offer the Fire HDX 7 for $199, though it will not receive the 4.0 Fire OS update until "later this year."

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