Although the iPad still has market share, you may have heard of the Kindle Fire nipping at its heals. This ultra-cheep tablet promises users an easy way to surf the web, listen to music, and even read books–the intention of traditional kindles. Is the Fire ready to compete in this saturated market with tablets that have built their brands on more than just e-reading? Let’s see.

So far, the new Kindle has come under fire for its lack of screen responsiveness, small size, paltry eight gigabyte memory, lack of camera, absence of a microphone, and a tiny app store. It seems like the Kindle Fire’s low price is in accordance with its lack of features.

The real issue I see with the Kindle Fire is the lack of variety users have in terms of e-book buying and reading. Unlike the iPad, the Fire only allows users to buy books from Amazon’s e-book store. On the iPad, users can buy e-books from a broad variety of sources including the Nook store, iBooks, Google’s e-book store, and even from Amazon’s online collection. So, if you’re looking for the best selection of e-books,the iPad is actually a better choice than the Fire, even though the Fire’s genesis is in the e-book world.

Of course, what we have yet to speak of is the price of the iPad in relation to the price of the Fire. The Fire is $300 less than the iPad. In other words, you can buy 2.5 Kindles for one iPad.

For the price, the Kindle will appeal to a different demographic than the iPad–one that is interested in buying a product with limited amenities for a great price. My guess is that we won’t be seeing a Marc Jacobs Kindle Fire case any time soon.