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Boeing Drops Wireless System For 787
K7DAN writes "It appears that state-of-the-art connectivity in Boeing's newest aircraft means a wired, not a wireless network. The Seattle Times reports that Boeing has abandoned plans to bring entertainment and information to passengers through a wireless system in its 787 Dreamliner due to possible production delays and potential conflicts with other radio services around the world. A side benefit is an actual reduction in weight using the wired system. Amazingly, the LAN cables needed to connect every seat in the aircraft weigh 150 lbs less than all the wireless antennae, access points, and thickened ceiling panels required to accommodate a wireless network (the design called for an access point above each row)." The article concludes: "The net impact, [a Boeing spokesman] said, is less technical risk, some weight saved, the system's flexibility and quality preserved plus 'a bit of schedule relief.'"
Wired seem to be a better solution for a plane anyhow, I wouldn't expect the need for moving around the plane with your laptop to be that massive, I mean people are usually pretty tied to their seats when going with a Boeing.
The problem probably is that different airline companies want different seating positions, but the article says that they should have solved this issue.
The article says nothing about how the LAN on the plane connects to the internet though. I think that is where the state of the art comes in, the only possible solution I see is through satellite connection, but with a moving plane I imagine that is going to give some problems.
Another problem in this is the bandwidth given by a satellite connection, if there are 20 passengers surfing the net that isn't going to give a lot of bandwidth pr. user.
Come on, you mean to tell me that Boeing wanted to put 100 some access points on this plane? You could get 2, MAYBE 3 Cisco 1131AG's placed strategically could fill the cabin completely.
:)
But, wired being much faster, I really can't argue
They forgot the costs of 10000 miles of Cat5 cable, though.
Well if it helps them why give them grief? Wired networks are : faster safer and apperently not as heavy as WiFi h/w I'm with their side... :)
Finally someone has woken up to the fact that wireless is not the be all and end all of data communications.
It has its place but not replacing wires for noapparent reason when the wires can do the job cheeper, lighter and faster!
Overkill much? I can see 1 AP per section between restrooms/flight attendant work areas, but per seat row? From the article it sounds like they're using some kind of RF signal, so it's not like they really would need to preserve line-of-sight. Anybody have details on why, exactly, they're need an AP for every row of seats?
I don't know about you, but my servers run on the power of cotton candy and happy thoughts. -Anonymous Coward
Considering every commercial airline's effort to offer WiFi to date has been scrapped either before takeoff (pun intended), or not long after launch. The costs are simply not supported by the revenue, simple as that. Other considerations like weight and maintenance complexity are secondary.
I am, therefore you think.
They would need to have cables running throughout the plane anyway to all the wireless antenna. Just put a hub in place of an antenna and run a few more cables to the seats. With all the shielding and such that a plane has, you'd probably need a boatload of antennas...Then you have to worry about extra shielding for all the onboard components, etc.
Besides, all this means is that the business traveler will have to carry around a 2 ft CAT 5 cable...big deal. I bet some creative laptop maker comes up with one of those airline power adapters that also integrates a CAT 5 cable in to it. Just plug the one end in to the back of your laptop, and plug in the power and network cables in to the appropriate ports on the other end.
How important is saving 150 pounds on a plane that weighs between 360k and 540k pounds on takeoff?
...if you're not moving around much, use a light little ethernet cable and save yourself all the hassle of wireless. It trumps wireless in speed, reliability and cost.
I’m old enough to remember 16K of memory being described as “whopping”
For laptops, this isn't a big deal--you're not going to roam about the cabin one way or another, and an ethernet cable to the armrest is hardly a huge burden when sitting still.
But WiFi would have been really zoomy for VoIP-enabled cell phones, so it's sort of a shame they won't be useable.
On the other hand, the last thing I want is to be sitting next to a cell phone user for 6 hours, so maybe this is a good thing..
how this makes sense for laptops as it shouldn't matter laptops generally have both, and there is no need to be mobile on a plane, but what about WiFi PDA's and the upcoming cell phones with wifi capabilities, both of those could be pretty important to an exec who needs to remain connected.
In a world of acronyms, the words are the real victims.
It's the same feeling I have scribbling notes in a meeting with a pencil rather than using my laptop.
12:50 - press return.
"Amazingly, the LAN cables needed to connect every seat in the aircraft weigh 150 lbs less than all the wireless antennae, access points, and thickened ceiling panels required to accommodate a wireless network (the design called for an access point above each row)."
So, obviously, they didn't spec this out with commodity hardware -- I'm guessing that and the extra shielding were to mitigate any radio interference that might mess with the avionics. But come on.. there has to be a wireless solution that uses less physical hardware than this.
- 'Drew
"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." -- Voltaire
You could probably just warfly some wireless connection from the ground if you really needed wireless in a plane, right?
..is allow you to take your laptop on the flight.
Blerg.
I scanned the article summary above and thought that Boeing was going to a Weird network. I skipped right to the article to see the details and was disappointed.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"First things first -- but not necessarily in that order"
-- The Doctor, "Doctor
They're going to have to find some reeeally long cables!
(I understand that's not what the article meant, but it's the first thing that popped into my head.)
An access point above every row? Maybe there is a technical reason that someone can point out, but that sounds just whacked to me... So now there are going to be jacks at every seat, people will need to carry a LAN cable and since we're crunching all the seats together to maximize profit thats one more coffee spilling device to invade the small world of the plane traveler's seat... Sigh...
There's... someone on the wing! Some... thing! And it's... trying to... leech wifi! </shatner>
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
... it was going to be too hard to implement the system. Imagine this cockpit conversation:
"Denver, AA325 - Requesting clearance to LAN - over"
"Negative, AA325 - do not land - over."
"No, not land, LAN - over"
"Landover? No - this is Denver - over."
"Roger, Denver..."
"Sorry, Clarence, no clearance."
etc...
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
On my last flight I noticed the in-flight entertainment system used Linux. How I noticed? It crashed in the middle of the flight and had to be rebooted. Tux in corner, kernel boot messages and everything.
I just can't decide if it was a good or bad sign for Linux.
The challenge I see with wired Ethernet is the connectors. Is a standard cat 5 jack designed for multiple plug insertions and removals every day? How often would the jacks need to be replaced and can this be done easily?
Now if only they would add Power-over-Ethernet...
Don't forget that your typical household WAP (let alone a commercial version) has enough transmitting power to register a good signal at least 10m away. I'm guessing, based on the paranoia about RFI in planes, that nothing CLOSE to that high powered would be considered acceptable.
It's quite probable that, for safety reasons, they were looking at a solution with a large number of very low power WAP's, which makes sense--you will have a lot less stray energy.
I don't think that the primary design concern is how to cover as much of the plane as possible with little equipment.
The article is not about internet access at all but distribution of inflight movies and entertainment. And there is not an access point at every row, but an antenna at every row (in the old scheme). If you read it, that's a receiving antenna that would then distribute the content to the seats in that row, not a transmitting antenna (access point).
Also, this plane is already several thousand pounds over the design weight, so I imagine that has something to do with this decision.
With wired they can sell premium seats with LAN, or cheaper seats without LAN. That would be harder to control with wireless.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
And think of how long the cord from the plane to the ground must be!
1) I spend how much on HIGH speed access, then I'm going to throttle it? Not!
2) I spend how much time on privacy and security, then I'm going to broadcast? Not!
3) I spend how much time tuning and tweaking Linux, but no device driver? Not!
Personally, I don't trust public access points for outgoing private information. Ever.
Please, sign me off the fing airwaves, AFAIC, hardwired is the only way to fly.
Words to men, as air to birds.
Now if I could just plug into the port in the back of my head I'd be all set!
Is this what our tax dollars pay for? IS IT?!!!
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
My laptop only has a wireless card, for whatever reason, I got that finally working with Linux and I just don't have time to deal with making the ancient ethernet card I don't know that I can even find work too (before anyone jumps on me, we're talking ancient hardware on all sides plus some potentially broken dongles and now nonexistent patience). Since everywhere I tend to frequent has wireless, it's been a zero priority, and I scored a device that generates a wireless point from an ethernet port that I intend to test more fully on my next few trips. I wonder if they'll have a problem with me using that on the plane?
But also has massive latency.
Worst case, you can easily throttle bandwidth to a particular row or seat to keep one user from sucking up too much.
What will be interesting is if first class passengers get more bandwidth than cattle class.
paintball
OH CRAP!!!
With 100Mbps ethernet connections at every seat, I wonder if they could sponser some killer LAN parties. Maybe show the current best players on the main screen? : )
Whatever you do, do NOT play cs_747!
paintball
Nope, just CAT-5 cable.
I mean people are usually pretty tied to their seats when going with a Boeing.
Boeing expects Google's Testing on the Toilet(TM) to really take off. They wanted to be prepared so that when it does take off, it doesn't hit the fan.
Expect wireless portables^H^H^Hility to be installed in the enhanced version of the 787 Dreamliner.
I find all this talk of internet access in economy hilarious. On most flights with the seat pitch what it is I can barely open a paperback book on the tray table. My laptop? Forget it!! It stays in the overhead bin.
I have found attempting to get any real work done on the plane to be futile at best. While I am not the most frequent flier around I fly enough for business (Permier Executive on United 4 years running now) to know that this is just ridiculous. No room, uncomfortable, power issues, no privacy... ...the best solution I have come up with is simply relaxing and "enjoying" the flight. While the 787 will be serving pretty long routes, I maintain that you will be fine not checking your email for 8 or so hours.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
Considering every commercial airline's effort to offer WiFi to date has been scrapped either before takeoff (pun intended), or not long after launch. The costs are simply not supported by the revenue, simple as that. Other considerations like weight and maintenance complexity are secondary.
The costs for an ADD-ON system are not supported by the revenue. Putting a wireless system on an EXISTING plane means you have to:
- Take the plane out of service
- Partially disassemble the plane
- Run supplemental wiring
- Install new access points and new compartments to hold them
- Bolt-on trasmit/receive device
- Reassemble plane
The costs of a system BUILT INTO the plane when it is FIRST CONSTRUCTED would be MUCH, MUCH lower. You just run your network wires at the same time you run all the other wiring for the plane. And you don't have to REPLACE receptacles etc with new ones, you just install the ones with ethernet jacks to begin with.
And, in this case, they're installing a wired network, not a wireless one. So even cheaper still.
paintball
Anyway,
AirCanada and some other airline companies have the new Brazillian-made Embraer 190's; JetBlue also just acquired some 190's. These placns have touch-screen on-demand video on every seat back: DVD-quality movies, TV shows, etc, and future expandibility to on-demand video games (via accompanying USB port next to monitor).
That's certainly the future of in-flight entertainment.
Pretty high-tech, given that you can pause/start your movie at any point in time, rewind/fastforward through title screens, etc. If Embraer can do it, why not Boeing?
if they use power over ethernet then they can make the in-seat entertainment system a thin client and use at least *some* off-the-shelf hardware (remember that aircraft electronics, even in entertainment, have to withstands many years of use, far longer than any consumer electronics have to).
it also means they could use SIP phones for providing in-flight telephony and put them on their own vlans, likewise have vlans for security cameras and remote controlled devices.
Figuring out how to wire a aircraft with multiple seating configurations is very, very hard. Go ask Airbus...
If this article had anything to do with internet access for passengers, that might have been an insightful point!
Or maybe you're suggesting that the ground crews will disassemble and reassemble each aircraft several times per day. If that's the case, the durability of the in-flight movie distribution system is the least of their worries.
Discussion here:
w ifi-service-die/
http://scobleizer.com/2006/08/17/why-did-boeings-
Boeing didn't kill its existing wifi because of cost to implement -- it was already implemented. Ongoing costs of basic service weren't justified when so few passengers were willing to pay for the service to begin with.
I am, therefore you think.
If it's available, I'll use it. This allows me to shut off my radio and save battery life!
There exists no way of exchanging information without making judgments. --Bene Gesserit Axiom
In Soviet Russia, Wi-Fi drops YOU! .....oh wait, that already happens here in the States.
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
Somebody will be downloading a Linux distro to see if the airplane can run Linux!
Did you even read the article you linked to? It says:
Anyway, what killed this was cost. When I met with the Connextion team they told me it costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to outfit a single plane with wifi.
Airlines didn't want to spend hundreds of thousands per plane to install the gear. So not only was it too expensive to put on planes, it was too expensive to maintain the satellite network to service the small number of planes with the service.
When ever 787 sold had the service installed standard, and has the power plug to run your laptop installed standard, the per-customer cost of providing the service is much, much lower, and the whole scheme becomes workable.
paintball
The best spot I can imagine is right above 1st-class, but that would require a rather large section of non-metallic surface to get coverage decently close to the horizon. The top of the tail could work, but it is rather small and probably full of mechanical parts. The tail isn't a place to be putting stuff that isn't critical for flight.
The situation gets much better if you don't mind having 3 to 6 dishes.
Way to selectively quote a single comment from the responses to the article.
How about the main body?
"I flew SAS flight to Copenhagen 1.5 years ago and paid my $30. But I could only use the Wifi service for two hours because my laptop's battery wouldn't last longer than that.
.
.
.
Sorry, normal people will do without wifi if they have to pay $30 for two hours."
You can't justify ANY cost, whether to implement or to maintain, with LITTLE OR NO revenue.
I am, therefore you think.
You can't blindly extrapolate the anecdotal experience of one user in one environment to the potential experience of all users in a different environment. Well, I suppose you CAN, but it is stupid to do so.
Just because it didn't work last time doesn't mean there isn't a market for it, especially if the last time it was done poorly - as an add-on to existing planes (expensive) that didn't have a way for people to power their laptops.
Did it perhaps occur to you that JUST MAYBE, in these brand-spanking-new ultra-modern planes, they might give people a way to power their laptop in order to sell them internet service?
Did it occur to you that maybe, if the cost of installing the hardware in the plane is half as much, they can get away with charging the passenger half as much, and then nearly everyone with a laptop pays for the service?
Plus, AGAIN, you're not even reading what you're quoting. The guy didn't even say that the service was too expensive. He was willing to pay $30 for internet on the flight. The PROBLEM was that his laptop ran out of power. Sounds like all they need to do to get the $30 is put some power outlets under the seats - very easy to do if you're building a NEW plane.
paintball