I made a deal with my daughter when we changed her school that when she got her grades back to where they were (mostly A's and a few B's) she could have my iPad 2. We expected her grades to take a dip and ...well assuming she does well on the last tests of the marking period she's headed for all A's the first marking period. We'd originally said after the first semester but there's strong lobbying from 2/3 of the household to change that to quarter because of how well she's doing. This is more than a toy--they use them quite a bit at school and the high school we plan for her to attend went to mandatory iPads this year so her being fluent in its use will be helpful.
So then that leaves me without the iPad. I pretty much only use it when traveling for reading, email, and web surfing which is why I made this deal back during the summer. I occasionally use One Note on there, but more often use it on my phone if not on a PC and there is a One Note web app. Other than that, most of the apps on there are just synced from my phone and never used. And I occasionally watch The Wood Whisperer on a plane but that's declined greatly since the free videos have mostly become ads for the Guild which I'm not really interested in. I see I could copy MP3 and MP4 files to the Fire HD. I already have an older Kindle and I could take that for reading and use my phone for web and email but I'm also thinking maybe I could get a 7" Kindle Fire HD which is under $200.
Keeping in mind my primary uses, what would I miss on a Kindle? Is the browser fully functional? How's the email, contacts, and calendar (Exchange for all and Gmail emaiil-only?) For those I'm not big on using the web apps on the tablet.