Amazon tablet has chips from TI, Samsung, Hynix

By Alistair Barr | Reuters

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos holds up the new Kindle Fire at a news conference during the launch of Amazon's new tablets in New York, September 28, 2011. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton.

(Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc's Kindle Fire tablet computer uses components from Texas Instruments, Samsung, LG and Hynix Semiconductor, according to repair firm iFixit, which cracked the device open on Tuesday. Amazon's first tablet computer shipped on Monday and the largest Internet retailer is expected to sell as many as five million of the devices in the fourth quarter and more next year. While that is not as many units as Apple Inc's market-leading iPad tablet, it is enough that investors have been watching to see which components are in the new device. "Three to five million units per quarter could be meaningful for certain component makers," said Brad Gastwirth, of independent research firm ABR Investment Strategy, LLC.

"For the fourth quarter, three to five million is pretty much baked in but if this grows to significantly more per quarter, it will become very significant to many component companies," he added. IFixit opened the Kindle Fire on Tuesday and an early look inside showed that the device includes chips made by Texas Instruments, Samsung and Hynix, said Miroslav Djuric, director of technical communication at iFixit. The main application processor is a Texas Instruments OMAP 4430 processor, Djuric added. Samsung supplied the 8 gigabyte flash memory chip, while Hynix made a DDR 2 RAM component for the device, Djuric said.

The Kindle Fire's display was made by LG, he also reported. The Kindle Fire looks similar to the BlackBerry PlayBook from Research in Motion, leading some analysts to speculate the devices have the same components. "It's similar to the PlayBook in the sense that it has the same basic components -- motherboard, battery, display," Djuric said. The PlayBook also uses the TI OMAP 4430 processor, he noted. "The case opens up similarly to the PlayBook as well," Djuric said. "But inside it has a completely different layout, smaller battery, and different orientations for its components."

(Reporting by Alistair Barr and Noel Randewich in San Francisco; Editing by Gary Hill, Bernard Orr)