Look out, this new Kindle Fire HD is hot!

• 7" 1280 x 800 HD display with IPS (In-Plane Switching technology)
• 1.2 GHz dual-core processor with Imagination PowerVR 3D graphics core
• Dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi (MIMO)
• Dolby audio and dual-driver stereo speakers
• Front-facing HD camera
• 16 or 32 GB internal storage

Turning the Kindle Fire HD over immediately leaves no doubt that this is a different Kindle than last year's tablet.

To keep up with the horizontal layout, the micro-USB and micro-HDMI ports are placed along the bottom edge of the Fire HD.

Button mashers rejoice—the Kindle Fire HD has actual physical volume buttons!

Along with the volume rocker, the right side of the Kindle houses the 3.5 mm headphone jack, power button, and the right speaker grille.

Game time! Let's play "Spot the Differences!" Can you tell these Kindles apart?

• Hint: one of these tablets is not like the other.

Give up? Well, we have Kindle Fire HD, a non-HD 2012 Kindle Fire, and a Nexus 7. You can tell apart the non-HD vs. HD Kindles by different camera placement and a small size discrepancy.

• We'll be including some non-HD Kindle Fire tidbits in this teardown, as it largely hasn't changed from last year's model.

Thickness comparison (top to bottom):

• Nexus 7: 10.4 mm
• Kindle Fire (2012): 11.43 mm
• Kindle Fire HD: 10.3 mm

Enough fun and games, let's get this Kindle open.

A plastic opening tool quickly removes the back case to reveal our first glimpse at the internals.

Not long ago, we praised the Nexus 7 for being so easy to get into compared to the iPad, and sacrificing only a single millimeter to do so.

Fast forward a couple months later, and Amazon has an easy-to-open tablet that's another 0.1 mm thinner than the Nexus 7. We've said it once, and we'll say it again: you don't need to sacrifice thinness to make a repairable device.

The newly revised Kindle Fire (left) and the Kindle Fire HD (right) lay side-by-side, both opened up and exposed to the sterile white lights of the iFixit teardown table.

The Kindle Fire HD is the big kid in town (for now), but that doesn't mean the refreshed Kindle Fire doesn't deserve a little peek inside, just for giggles.

Though the non-HD Kindle Fire motherboard layout is pretty much the same as last year, Amazon switched up the design and layout of a few connectors:

• The design of the digitizer ribbon cable has been minimally altered.
• The ambient light sensor socket is missing from the motherboard, though the trace is still present on the board.

But, let's resume focus on the device du jour: the just-released HD variant of the Kindle Fire.

The battery is secured by four Phillips #00 screws and one lonely T5 Torx screw.

• While this single T5 Torx isn't going to keep out our prying fingers, it might be enough to sour the battery removal attempts of someone who is less well-equipped. Lesson learned, kids: don't bring your Phillips to a Torx fight.

Well this is a first. The battery is enclosed within a metal casing. We believe this is for structural reinforcement, as well as for shielding the battery from any possible electrical damage.

The Kindle Fire HD gets its spark from a 3.7 V, 4400 mAh, 16.43 Wh Li-ion battery that—as in most mobile devices—dominates most of the inner real estate.

Amazon says this Kindle will operate for 11 hours without having to plug it in. That is a whole four extra episodes of Family Guy than the Nexus 7 will give you.

What have we here? A stand-alone, replaceable headphone jack. Amazon: thanks for caring about repairability!

The standard 3.5 mm audio jack will allow you to plug in any standard headphones or external speakers, even your fancy new Apple EarPods.

The motherboard — which is the second-largest killer of real estate inside the Kindle Fire HD — is the next component to fall victim to our prying hands.

With some careful work with a razor blade we were able to peel up the copper tape covering the main processor. The copper tape allows the processor to dissipate heat, but is more problematic to remove than a good ol' fashioned heat sink.