Rent an iPad For Inflight Entertainment

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Rent an iPad For Inflight Entertainment

Posted by samzenpus on Tuesday June 1, 2010 @01:06AM from the would-you-like-an-apple-product-with-your-meal? dept.

OzPeter writes "Jetstar will start renting out of pre-loaded iPads as a form of inflight entertainment instead of the more typical seat back video system. No word in the article on how or if they will handle Wi-Fi connections, but interestingly it does mention that they will be usable during takeoff and landings — something that will be sure to spark lots of discussion regarding planes and modern electronics."

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Aircraft electronics by Joce640k · 2010-06-01 01:09 · Score: 5, Informative

Aircraft electrics have been WiFi/phone safe for decades, if they weren't then every lightning bolt with 100 miles would be a threat.
The reasons for not allowing those things aren't to do with safety.

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1. Re:Aircraft electronics by EdZ · 2010-06-01 01:12 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  On commercial aircraft, yes. Light aircraft,however, especially older craft, are not shielded. Rather than test every aircraft with a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable, and then subclassify them by what devices you can use on what craft, it's a damn sight easier to go the 'Better Safe Than Sorry' approach and blanket-ban.
2. Re:Aircraft electronics by fotbr · 2010-06-01 01:13 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  More accurately, they aren't to do with the plane's safety. There is still an argument that using electronic devices keeps you from paying attention to the flight attendants' instructions. I don't believe that one, but since most people under the age of 25 or so seem to have those stupid iBuds stuffed in their ears at all times, perhaps it has some merit.
3. Re:Aircraft electronics by NoPantsJim · 2010-06-01 01:16 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Actually, in a roundabout way, it does have to do with safety.
  
  Takeoff and landing are the times in flight most likely to result in an accident. If things do suddenly head sideways, people distracted by laptops and iPods are much less likely to react accordingly and survive.
  
  Most people in the aviation business know this is the real reason.
  
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4. Re:Aircraft electronics by calmofthestorm · 2010-06-01 01:17 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  It's not like there's any useful information there after the 7th time you've heard it and read the info card out of boredom. Video/speech is a very slow, ineffecient way of transferring information compared to vanilla text. I find it ver yfrustartaing to be presented with a video to teach/explain something when simple text would do. Maybe hte reason those damn young ones on your lawn don't pay attention is because there's nothing useful being expressed.
  Cell phones can mess with ground towers due to the speeds at which the planes are moving which is a reason to turn them off[line] (not like you're going to get good reception in a plane anyway)
  
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5. Re:Aircraft electronics by Anonymous Coward · 2010-06-01 01:19 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  On commercial aircraft, yes. Light aircraft,however, especially older craft, are not shielded. Rather than test every aircraft with a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable, and then subclassify them by what devices you can use on what craft, it's a damn sight easier to go the 'Better Safe Than Sorry' approach and blanket-ban.
  If anything, the older aircraft would be less subject to EM interference, since they'd have fewer electronics, and those electronics would probably be much hardier than modern IC-based gear. There's a reason they were never tested; it was inconceivable that anything short of a nuclear blast could possibly interfere with them.
  As for "a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable"...are pilots really so superstitious that they think an iPad emits a different sort of aircraft-confounding rays than a ThinkPad or a Palmcorder?
6. Re:Aircraft electronics by IndustrialComplex · 2010-06-01 01:20 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  More accurately, they aren't to do with the plane's safety. There is still an argument that using electronic devices keeps you from paying attention to the flight attendants' instructions. I don't believe that one, but since most people under the age of 25 or so seem to have those stupid iBuds stuffed in their ears at all times, perhaps it has some merit.
  Most earbuds block less sound than foam earplugs and they don't ask us to remove them.
  If a flight attendant really needed our attention on a plane, chances are the situation would be quite evident. You are already supposed to be buckled up in case of sudden turbulence, and in the event of a emergency where you would have to leave your seat, people aren't going to be more distracted by their MP3s.
  
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7. Re:Aircraft electronics by ThunderBird89 · 2010-06-01 01:21 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  As if anyone these days needed the instructions: I'm pretty sure 99.999% of fliers are already familiar with the procedures, there's an illustrated card on the back of every seat, and people can pretty much rely on common sense.
  
  Not that any of that is worth shit when the plane plows into the ground at 160 kmph, and you have lim(0) chance of survival with or without having listened through the lecture.
  
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8. Re:Aircraft electronics by Altima(BoB) · 2010-06-01 01:24 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  And if you build your own flying combat suit (perhaps with a red and gold color scheme...) you can listen to it every time you take off!
  
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9. Re:Aircraft electronics by jellomizer · 2010-06-01 01:29 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Well you are more willing to let go and drop a book or a news paper then a piece of expensive electronics. If the plane is going in to a hard landing and you need to brace yourself you are more likely to drop a book or a paper and brace yourself... For a laptop or an expensive device you may put it away or keep it safe while you should be protecting your own neck.
  
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10. Re:Aircraft electronics by RedLeg · 2010-06-01 01:32 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  The reasons for not allowing those things aren't to do with safety.
  The reasons have EVERYTHING to do with safety, just not the way most people think.
  The airlines and the FAA don't want passengers to be distracted or rows and aisles to be encumbered. Passengers need to be alert enough take direction from the aircrew (pilots + flight attendants) and free to maneuver in times of emergency. The most likely times for emergencies are during takeoffs and landings, hence the ban.
  It has nothing to with harmful interference with avionics, but with interrupting communications and encumbering maneuvering.
  Consider trying to get up and use the head from a window seat when the passengers in the row ahead have their seats reclined, and those on your row have tables down and laptops out. Add earphones in ears impeding hearing, and you get a mess in an emergency.
  Red
11. Re:Aircraft electronics by YouWantFriesWithThat · 2010-06-01 01:38 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  i am not flying the plane.
  
  there is no amount of concentration on my part that is going to help when the plane banks sharply on take off, slams into the ground, and begins cartwheeling through a cornfield spewing burning jet fuel while rows of seats tear off the floor and fall out of holes in the plane.
  
  but if i could listen to music, at least i wouldn't have to hear everyone else screaming as i burned to death in an aluminum tube
12. Re:Aircraft electronics by vlm · 2010-06-01 01:42 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  On commercial aircraft, yes. Light aircraft,however, especially older craft, are not shielded.
  Humorously, no. You inspect HV power lines with a Cessna or a helicopter, not a fully loaded 747.
  No one takes low altitude sight seeing flights in a 747.
  Its not like the high power radio transmitter towers to the east of timmerman and north of mitchell airport in Milwaukee somehow magically know they are supposed to interfere with the light planes but not the big planes. Theres no little eyeball on the top of the tower.
  Light planes are pretty simple. You screw up the fuel management system on a major jetliner, you get big problems transferring fuel from tank 7 to tank 18 and weight and balance get all screwed up, now is engine 3 feeding out of tank 2 or is that cross connected to tank 9 again? In comparison, on the old 172 I flew in the 80s (eek) the fuel management system was an emergency shut off valve from the overhead tanks, a left/right/both tank selector switch, and an electric backup fuel pump with a circuit breaker and a switch. And a fuel gauge meter than was about 1/2 inch square and could not be read more accurately than "full, empty, or somewhere in between". It was so old it had a mechanical carb instead of a fuel injection system.
  
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13. Re:Aircraft electronics by jittles · 2010-06-01 01:45 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  That's not entirely true. They do not allow them during takeoff and landings because these are the most dangerous parts of the flight. If there is some sort of emergency the last thing they (and I) want is the guy in the emergency exit row to miss some important instruction because he was too busy watching a movie.
  Sure these emergencies are rare and unlikely to happen but I don't mind reading the magazine in the seat pocket for 10-15 minutes just to be on the safe side.
14. Re:Aircraft electronics by arielCo · 2010-06-01 02:00 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  On commercial aircraft, yes. Light aircraft,however, especially older craft, are not shielded. Rather than test every aircraft with a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable, and then subclassify them by what devices you can use on what craft, it's a damn sight easier to go the 'Better Safe Than Sorry' approach and blanket-ban.
  If anything, the older aircraft would be less subject to EM interference, since they'd have fewer electronics, and those electronics would probably be much hardier than modern IC-based gear.
  I guess the GP meant "too old to be properly shielded, modern enough to have lots of electronics", not a DC-3 ;). The problem with electronic gizmos hit when planes already had a lot of electronic instruments. Indeed, Wikipedia tells me the Boeing 737-400 started flying in 1985 and had a full glass cockpit.
  
  those electronics would probably be much hardier than modern IC-based gear.
  If anything, a PCB with discrete components has longer exposed copper (a requisite for EM induction) than an IC measuring 4x4 mm doing the same function. "They don't make them like they used to" is wholly untrue in this field.
  
  There's a reason they were never tested; it was inconceivable that anything short of a nuclear blast could possibly interfere with them.
  They're hard to mess with from outside the cigar tube; they weren't designed to deal with random EMF inside it, other than their own.
  
  As for "a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable"...are pilots really so superstitious that they think an iPad emits a different sort of aircraft-confounding rays than a ThinkPad or a Palmcorder?
  Of course they're revising their safety standards, and they start with a popular device. Just to nitpick, the switching DC-DC converter in a laptop and the little inverter for the CCFL backlight can be some noisy buggers.
  
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15. Re:Aircraft electronics by Anonymous Coward · 2010-06-01 02:00 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  As for "a battery of EM tests for every device imaginable"...are pilots really so superstitious that they think an iPad emits a different sort of aircraft-confounding rays than a ThinkPad or a Palmcorder?
  Of course it does. Remember, the iPad is magic. The ThinkPad/Palmcorder aren't.
  Very few airplanes are properly shielded against magic.
16. Re:Aircraft electronics by geminidomino · 2010-06-01 02:01 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Funny you should mention that card. I'm glad I already know the (not complicated) instructions since the completely wordless cards are actually harder to understand....
17. Re:Aircraft electronics by IndustrialComplex · 2010-06-01 02:03 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Humorously, no. You inspect HV power lines with a Cessna or a helicopter, not a fully loaded 747.
  You also are doing the inspection on VFR days, so if VOR gets screwed up it's not that big of a deal.
  
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18. Re:Aircraft electronics by pandrijeczko · 2010-06-01 02:39 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  I said "old", not "mature" - and Metallicock are "Mastered As Puppets" by their corporate lords... plus all their "music" sounds like each band member is racing to finish each song first.
  There, out of my system now, switching back to "mature" mode...
  
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19. Re:Aircraft electronics by Dishevel · 2010-06-01 03:00 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  That is because you weren't around when metal started little shit.
  
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20. Re:Aircraft electronics by 5pp000 · 2010-06-01 04:24 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  I distinctly recall that, in the days when analog cassette players were still around but digital devices had appeared, the instruction to turn off devices for takeoff and landing applied only to the digital ones -- use of cassette players was specifically allowed.
  
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21. Re:Aircraft electronics by paeanblack · 2010-06-01 04:50 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  The problem with electronic gizmos hit when planes already had a lot of electronic instruments.
  The real problem is that a cellphone at 10,000ft over an urban area can see a crapton of cell towers. The system wasn't originally designed to have one phone talking to 500 towers while moving at 450 knots. That the inter-cell traffic to constantly hand off that phone and coordinate everything put a huge strain on the system.
  Also, the airlines didn't want cellphones competing with their existing Airphone at $5/minute.
  The 1991 cellphone ban on airplanes had little to do with safety...it was about technical limitations and price gouging. Selling the ban as "for safety reasons" was just the easiest way to get everyone to comply and to speak up if their rowmate broke the rules.
  Nowadays, the cell system is far more robust, and phones at altitude aren't so disruptive. The Airphone is mostly dead. Congress is looking into relaxing the ban. People are also realizing that thousands of cellphones get used on planes every day, either intentionally or accidentally left on, and thousands of planes aren't crashing every day.
  The biggest resistance to lifting the ban now is that people don't want to sit next to someone screaming into a cellphone for several hours.
The real reason for takeoff and landing bans is sa by Joe+The+Dragon · 2010-06-01 01:11 · Score: 4, Insightful

The real reason for takeoff and landing bans is safety as in they don't want stuff flying around if there is a hard landing.
Not on UK airlines they won't by gb7djk · 2010-06-01 01:21 · Score: 4, Insightful

The UK airlines flatly ban *all* electronic equipment from being switched on during take off or landing. Although the official excuse is always "to protect the delicate navigation equipment", this is demonstrably rubbish as aircraft equipment is pretty well screened and filtered. It *is* true that in pre CE certification days, certain mobile equipment did have some unfortunate spurii, but CE testing got rid of all of them decades ago. Which means that we are left with either a) the cabin crew need to demonstrate who's boss or b) the airlines don't want equipment flying about if there is any nasty tail waving or bumps during take off or landing.
Re:daily tampon story? by quantumplacet · 2010-06-01 01:27 · Score: 5, Funny

If you want to troll, try harder. Here's a hint, tampons aren't pads, they're cylindrical. You did however do a nice job of proving beyond any doubt that you've never had a girlfriend.
In case of a crash... by Alwin+Henseler · 2010-06-01 01:35 · Score: 2, Funny

If things do suddenly head sideways, people distracted by laptops and iPods are much less likely to react accordingly and survive.
Not important... the point is this: if your plane crashes and rescue workers are sorting through the debris & body parts, would you want to be found with an airplane seat stuck in your skull, or with an iPad stuck in your skull?
Keeping in mind that the reality distortion field surrounding an Apple product makes anyone look cooler, the choice is clear: you'll look better with a iPad stuck in your skull. That $10 premium looks like a small price to pay for the privilige, doesn't it? (Apple fanboy or not). On top of that: no worries on compensating the full iPad's price in case it gets damaged in such a crash - you just can't go wrong here!
Re:daily tampon story? by OzPeter · 2010-06-01 01:35 · Score: 4, Interesting

seriously enough with the tampon stories.
The funny thing is that I submitted this partly on the basis of seeing how fast an iStory would be accepted. My previous submissions have always seemed to languish around for a significant amount of time before being accepted or rejected (especially rejected), yet this one was accepted within 12 hours of submission.

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Re:daily tampon story? by fustakrakich · 2010-06-01 01:43 · Score: 3, Funny

...they're cylindrical.
I guess he should've posted here then..

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Just more stupid iHype by jedidiah · 2010-06-01 01:46 · Score: 2, Insightful

Airliners already have very robust inflight DVR systems that make something like a stuffed 500G Archos moot. Throwing an iPad into the mix doesn't really add anything. If this sort of rental would be seen as anything as redundant then the airline in question is already far behind the curve. I'm not sure I would trust them to get the content end of things right with the iPad.
This sounds like a lame marketing stunt.

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Re:And will the standard rates apply? by IndustrialComplex · 2010-06-01 02:11 · Score: 3, Funny

Great plan. I'm sure you'll get a great cell signal at 30,000 feet over the middle of an ocean.
What the hell kind of kickass hotel are you staying at that flys at 30k feet ASL?
Hint: He might have been planning an alternative to Marriott's high data rates.

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Re:oddball by ktappe · 2010-06-01 02:36 · Score: 2, Insightful

Actually there is a reason [for turning off electronics during takeoff & landing]
No normal electronic device you would get at Best Buy will cause any problems for aircraft systems.
But, it is possible that some oddball, third world, home made one could.
Since the airline cannot take the time to inspect every gadget you bring on board, you get the current rules.
Two problems with that theory:
1) Anyone able to afford an airline ticket is able to afford real electronics instead of homebrewing.
2) Anyone independent enough to homebrew a device is also independent enough to not turn it off during takeoff & landing.

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Re:oddball by hotsauce · 2010-06-01 02:37 · Score: 2, Insightful

But, it is possible that some oddball, third world, home made one could.
You must have been under a rock for the last few decades. Every electronic device is made in the "third world". They've been handing us our collective asses, if you haven't noticed.

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There is also the issue of attention by Hazelfield · 2010-06-01 02:55 · Score: 2, Insightful

Most of the accidents happen during take-off or landing. In case something happens, the captain may need the full attention of the passengers to inform or instruct them. If people sit using notebooks, listening to music, watching movies etc, this will become very much less effective.

Additionally, if a plane crashes, the less stuff lying around the better. Notebooks can become projectiles, earphone cords can become a hindrance for evacuation, and having your hands full is just generally a bad idea. Banning electronic equipment is a safety issue that has nothing to do with electricity itself, in much the same way as texting and driving.