Boeing's Connexion announcement

Mailman List Mirror (Read Only)
1

I just got email that some of you may have also received, talking about the end of the service, reasons, etc.

The interesting piece is that the service will be free from now through Dec 31 when they turn off the system. Their homepage has a new link so you can sign up in advance, and then use the system when you fly on any equipped airline free.

http://www.connexionbyboeing.com/

They say that there is currently no suitor.

It sure would be nice if there was one. Maybe the Connexion folks on the list could tell us what is needed to make it work on the network side - I'm sure we have enough resources between us to handle that. And there are a number of aircraft that already have the equipment...

/rlj

2

Hello;

I just got email that some of you may have also received, talking about the end of the service, reasons, etc.

The interesting piece is that the service will be free from now through Dec 31 when they turn off the system. Their homepage has a new link so you can sign up in advance, and then use the system when you fly on any equipped airline free.

http://www.connexionbyboeing.com/

They say that there is currently no suitor.

It sure would be nice if there was one. Maybe the Connexion folks on the list could tell us what is needed to make it work on the network side - I'm sure we have enough resources between us to handle that. And there are a number of aircraft that already have the equipment...

You will need sufficient resources to pay for the satellite transponder channels - 14 in
all IIRC (or get the service from elsewhere). These are all being given back.

Regards
Marshall

3

The biggest obstacles to success for a service of this type are a) high cost and b) the lack of AC power throughout most commercial airliners. Some folks are willing to put up with a), but not for just a couple of hours due to b).

Until AC power is prevalent throughout the cabins of commercial airliners, it's unclear whether such a service will attract sufficient subscribers to become economically viable, IMHO.

4

I disagree.

Seat power is ubiquitous on some airlines (e.g. American), and available in all but coach on others (e.g. Virgin, Luftansa). It's useful and requested enough that Virgin actually uses it as a reason to fly "premium economy" (or whatever they call it).

iGo's & their cousins are available at every major airport, as well as most electronics & computer shops, and sell millions upon millions per year.

Add to that laptops with 5 & 7 hour life spans becoming more common, and even seat power is not as necessary.

AC power is not required. Bigger seats might be. :slight_smile:

5

Actually, seat power isn't yet truly ubiquitous on American, though it's becoming more common in their coach cabins over time (I fly American more than any other airline).

Increased battery life will help, although folks often won't be entering the aircraft with fully-charged batteries, and it's going to be a long time before the majority of laptops in use have some sort of longer-life battery capacity.

And coach is where most people fly. Many business travelers are forced to fly coach by their travel departments unless/until they acquire enough frequent-flyer miles to occasionally upgrade, or pay out of pocket.

6

Sorry, I must be missing something here. What prevents you from equipping EmPower equipped planes with the service? Ubiquity isn't required to add this to those aircraft that have the facilities. It's not like an entire fleet today has the same features across all planes as it stands today.

Such a service would probably only make sense for transcon U.S. flights, where the lack of connectivity can be noticed. And on those routes (at least the airline that I fly) I have about half a dozen or so EmPowered choices each day between, say, Atlanta and Los Angeles.

If there is demand, somebody will find a way.

Best regards,
Christian

7

I think a hotspot-like monthly pass option for flights of any duration would receive strong uptake, were the service ubiquitous, which will require near-universal availability of power in economy-class cabins, IMHO.

Understand, this is all just my personal opinion; I would -love- for this service to be economically viable so that I could use it. I just believe that there are certain preconditions which must be met for it to succeed.

8

patrick,

I disagree.

i disagree with your disagreement.

Seat power is ubiquitous on some airlines (e.g. American), and
available in all but coach on others (e.g. Virgin, Luftansa). It's

"all but coach"? seriously? hilarious.

"democracy is available to all but the majority"

"wealth is available for all but the middle class and poor"

come on.

seat power is not ubiquitous on american, either. it's on every 3rd
seat or some nonense and there's no way to figure out whether you are
in such a seat.

i identified this early on as one of th emajor factors causing this
service to fail.

AC power is not required. Bigger seats might be. :slight_smile:

bigger seats may not be required. ac power is.

P.S. I used it for > 4 hours on Luftansa in coach, without seat
power. And would happily pay $27.95, perhaps more, to use it again.

/me too. the price is well-worth it.

t.

9

I disagree.

i disagree with your disagreement.

You are welcome to your opinion.

Seat power is ubiquitous on some airlines (e.g. American), and
available in all but coach on others (e.g. Virgin, Luftansa). It's

"all but coach"? seriously? hilarious.

"democracy is available to all but the majority"

"wealth is available for all but the middle class and poor"

come on.

In Virgin, BA, etc., there are frequently -four- classes on an international flight. You can get "premium economy" just by having status on some airlines, or buying a full-fare coach ticket on others (e.g. BA). It really ain't that hard, or expensive. Especially for biz travelers who can't always make plans a month in advance.

That said, yeah, I mostly fly coach.

seat power is not ubiquitous on american, either. it's on every 3rd
seat or some nonense and there's no way to figure out whether you are
in such a seat.

i identified this early on as one of th emajor factors causing this
service to fail.

Interestingly, I fly over 50K miles per year on AA on average and have very, very rarely not had seat power. Guess I've been lucky.

BTW: Jet Blue, whom I love otherwise, says they will not install seat power. Something about the cabling for the TV. They were very nice about my request, but very firm about not having any plans for seat power any time in the future. I guess TVs make more money than laptops.

AC power is not required. Bigger seats might be. :slight_smile:

bigger seats may not be required. ac power is.

This is where we disagree. My G4 PB gives me 4 hours of use with a new batter, and over 2 hours with a 3 year old battery. I hear the new Intel ones give 5+ hours. How much do you need? SJC <-> IAD is only 5/6 hours, and you can't use your laptop the whole time (take off, landing, snacks, toilet breaks, etc.).

However, that same 12" PB (not a large laptop by any definition) on Luftansa is close unusable in coach if the person in front of you leans back. I had to contort pretty horribly to use it. (Which I did, 'cause I -had- to send e-mail from the plane. :slight_smile: Lack of seat power was not an issue, I just had two batteries. And this was BOS - > MUC, which ain't a short flight.

Using a 15" or larger laptop on that flight is essentially unthinkable. I could not have opened the laptop enough to see the screen. During meals, the flight attendants made everyone sit up, otherwise the people behind them wouldn't have been able to eat. Yes, it was that bad.

Summary: Bigger seats are required, seat power may not be. Maybe this is how they get you to upgrade so you can use seat power. :slight_smile:

P.S. I used it for > 4 hours on Luftansa in coach, without seat
power. And would happily pay $27.95, perhaps more, to use it again.

/me too. the price is well-worth it.

At least we agree on something.

10

It's quite likely that on a grander scale of things, it's better economy that the few people who want to use their laptop the whole flight, do get two batteries, than doing the investment of putting AC power in all seats.

Otoh, more batteries on planes increases the risk of fire due to exploding batteries happening in the plane :stuck_out_tongue:

11

patrick, all,

>>AC power is not required. Bigger seats might be. :slight_smile:
>
>bigger seats may not be required. ac power is.

However, that same 12" PB (not a large laptop by any definition) on
Luftansa is close unusable in coach if the person in front of you
leans back. I had to contort pretty horribly to use it. (Which I
did, 'cause I -had- to send e-mail from the plane. :slight_smile: Lack of seat
power was not an issue, I just had two batteries. And this was BOS -
> MUC, which ain't a short flight.

Using a 15" or larger laptop on that flight is essentially
unthinkable. I could not have opened the laptop enough to see the
screen. During meals, the flight attendants made everyone sit up,
otherwise the people behind them wouldn't have been able to eat.
Yes, it was that bad.

i managed to post:

http://www.renesys.com/blog/2006/04/tracking_plane_flight_on_inter.shtml

with a 15" thinkpad from coach on lufthansa.

so that includes the ssh session to screen to coorindate with
coworkers, the several browsers, the emacs window and all the typing.
it's not a short post, it has pictures that had to be screencaptured
(or grabbed from the boeing nanog preso, respectively), but it wasn't
overly difficult. maybe i'm just more of a contorionist than most.

the issue of power is the same, i think as the even bigger issue of
consistency/predictability which is what rodney was trying to point
out, i think. people want to know that they're going to be able to
use the service and they want to know this in advance. since no
airline rolled it out on every single flight and no airline gave
advance notice to passengers which flights would have the service, it
was impossible to plan on being able to use it. that does two things:
1) it reduces the value of the service since it now becomes a happy
coincidence rather than a planned part of the work day; 2) it makes it
less likely that everyone will already have a full charge on their
laptop batteries.

having power at every seat would be easy and they should just do it.

t

12

I wrote a 800 word article on a 15" Powerbook in Singapore Airlines economy class last year, and filed it via Connexion…and that was quite neck-yanking enough.

13

This may be a nit, but, you will _NEVER_ see AC power at any, let alone all of
the seats. Seat power that works with the iGo system is DC and is not
conventional 110 AC.

Owen

14

Owen DeLong wrote:

This may be a nit, but, you will _NEVER_ see AC power at any, let alone all of
the seats. Seat power that works with the iGo system is DC and is not
conventional 110 AC.

Is this your final answer? I've used AC power in lufthansa business class. Makes the 8 or 9 hour trip back to the states much more interesting if you can have internet via connexion the whole way.

/vijay

15

This may be a nit, but, you will _NEVER_ see AC power at any, let
alone all of the seats. Seat power that works with the iGo system is
DC and is not conventional 110 AC.

Perhaps I was hallucinating, but when I flew from Auckland to LAX on
Air New Zealand earlier this year, I had a 110V outlet into which I
plugged my laptop's regular power brick. The most popular seat power
is still the EmPower which needs an iGo or other special adapter, but
you'll increasingly find DC 12V shaped like a car's cigar lighter
socket and AC 110V with a receptacle that takes most common shapes of
AC power plugs.

You can find a reasonable overview here:

  http://www.seatguru.com/articles/in-seat_laptop_power.php

In with the seat diagrams elsewhere on the site, it tells you what
kind of power each type of plane has and where the outlets are. Too
bad we're not likely to have Internet access to go along with them.

R's,
John

16

I, too, have used AC power on long flights, IIRC on Virgin Upper Class.

17

On my flights to Asia (from seattle) I tend to have power
available.

http://www.seatguru.com/airlines/Northwest_Airlines/Northwest_Airlines_Airbus_A332.php

  I usually just play the in-flight trivia game for the 9hr
flight though. It does represent there being power available.

  - Jared

18

Wrong. It's standard on Air New Zealand, and it's been on Singapore Air
seats I've had as well.

                                -Bill

19

Owen DeLong wrote:

This may be a nit, but, you will _NEVER_ see AC power at any, let alone all of
the seats. Seat power that works with the iGo system is DC and is not
conventional 110 AC.

Into which the laptop user plugs the inverter he has in his carry-on that he bought for use in the rental car, producing 115vac (240 if from Europe). Into this he plugs the laptop SMPS, into which he plugs the laptop. Horribly inefficient, but that's the way Joe Sixpack does it. He probably doesn't have much of a choice.

It's a pity that laptop makers don't either design their machines to operate on a nominal 13.8 VDC or sell a relatively inexpensive and commonly available 13.8-to-[whatever DC voltage the laptop uses on whatever oddball connector they use that seems to be unique to that make and model and likely serial number and unavailable anywhere].

20

Owen DeLong wrote:

This may be a nit, but, you will _NEVER_ see AC power at any, let alone
all of
the seats. Seat power that works with the iGo system is DC and is not
conventional 110 AC.

Arnic 628 is a 16 volt dc, maximum 100 watts per seat, dc conversion to
15 volts (aircraft power bus is 400hz 110volt ac) and from 15 to
whatever your laptop requires put the effective power limit at about 75
watts

The approach of the airlines and the faa is to limit the number of
outlets and their variety based on the load that the system can support.
most in-service aircraft simply aren't generating enough power to
deliver it to every seat in the plane.