The world Wednesday

But founder Jeff Bezos all in all surprised the world Wednesday by unveiling the Kindle Fire, a polished and potent 7-inch device with a $199 price intended to disrupt the surging market for Web tablets and erode the dominance of Apple Inc.'s iPad.

Electronics stores are littered with iPad challengers - many running the same Android software that's inside the Fire - however Amazon is entering the fray with a strong brand, the Kindle's reputation for quality and an array of online media content and services.

Amazon as well has given the Fire an innovative new "split" browser called Amazon Silk, which runs in part on the device and in part on the EC2 cloud-computing network that Amazon operates.

Perhaps most important, Amazon is competing with a low-end price on high-end hardware. Bezos made this point over and over while the brief, Apple-esque launch event Wednesday in New York.

The market for Web tablets for the then

Apple is expected to hold its dominating lead in the market for Web tablets for the then and there few years however face growing competition from Amazon, other makers of Android tablets and systems running Microsoft's Windows 8, expected to debut in 2012. Innovation firm Gartner previously this month predicted that 63.6 million tablets will be sold this year, up 261 percent over last year. Annual sales are expected to reach 326.3 million units in 2015.

The Kindle Fire runs applications built for Google's Android platform, which is inside the device, in accordance with a special interface resembling a bookshelf that displays recently viewed items. Files can be loaded to the device via a USB cable, and there's a dual-core processor and 8 gigabytes of internal storage.

The Kindle Fire

Amazon designed the Kindle Fire by and large for consuming - and buying - movies, TV shows, music, books and other media that are stored in and streamed from Amazon's network. That is, it's a console plugged into the company's servers, where the heavy lifting is done.

"We have Amazon Web Services, Amazon Prime, Kindle, Amazon Instant Video, our MP3 store and the app store for Android," Bezos explained. "We asked ourselves, is there some way that we can bring all of these things at the same time into a remarkable product offering that clients would love? The answer is yes - it's called Kindle Fire."

Questioned afterward, Amazon executives sidestepped questions about competing with the iPad, however noted that the Kindle Fire costs less than half as much as Apple's device, which starts at $499.

"In one fell swoop, Amazon harnesses its commanding lead in cloud services, the content richness of a leading online retailer and its successful Kindle business strategy to deliver what might become one of most effective antidotes to the mobile bandwidth crunch," he said in a note sent afterwards the launch.

Given the big investment Amazon is making in the browser innovation, it seems likely that it will be extended to other devices beyond the Fire, similar to the way the Kindle reading software was extended from Amazon's device to most computing platforms.

A look at some of the major differences between Amazon's just-announced tablet computer, the Kindle Fire, and Apple's popular iPad:

Price: The Kindle Fire, which connects to the Web over Wi-Fi networks, will cost $199 when it begins selling on Nov. 15. The iPad costs $499-$829, depending on storage capacity and its wireless capabilities.

Apps: Kindle Fire users will have built-in access to the Amazon Appstore, which includes thousands of free and paid games and apps. Apple currently offers more than 425,000 free and paid games and apps in its online App Store - more than 100,000 of which are tailored exactly for the iPad - including apps for Amazon.com and the Kindle.