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Tags: In-Flight Cell Phones / Oman Air / Cell Phones / In-flight WiFi / Airlines / Airline News / In-flight Entertainment / → All Tags

Phone Home from Oman Air, As They Allow In-Flight Cell Phones and Texting

Oman Air first impressed us with their unnecessarily nice bathrooms, but now they are moving forward to ruin the entire flight experience—maybe. They are launching full mobile capabilities for first class, business, and economy customers. That means cell phones for all up in the skies. You’ll be welcome to text, tweet, and call all of your friends from your seat. Things should be up and running by the middle of February, which is just in time to apologize to your sweetie for not being home on Valentine’s Day.

In-flight WiFi is also coming to the airline’s entire fleet of Airbus A330s, but cell phones ringing throughout the cabin has us worried. We’ve heard some awful ring tones and text message alerts, and are really hoping that passengers leave things on silent. The airline does promise that the crews will control the services, and that the mobile magic can be limited during quiet times like overnight flights.

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Tags: Disability Travel / Travel Tips / In-Flight Entertainment / → All Tags

Jaunted's Guide to Flying for the Hearing-Impaired

We've geeked out over the airlines in-flight entertainment offerings and the status of in-flight WiFi enough here on Jaunted but we've recently realized that these technological advancements still leave a certain group out of the loop--the hearing impaired.

You may take for granted that you can watch movies (whether you paid $8 for them on your seatback or if it's playing overhead) but in fact, most in-flight entertainment offerings don't even offer closed captioning.

And while some Southwest flight attendants get creative with their boarding announcements, there's no sign language interpreter for the hearing impaired. This is probably fine when it comes to rapping flight attendants but what happens when there's an emergency?

According to the National Center for Health Statistics, 37 million adults of all ages in the United States reported some degree of hearing loss in 2006. This includes a range of impairments, from those having problems hearing to those who are completely deaf.

So we thought we'd look at how airlines are accommodating these kinds of travelers.

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Tags: Virgin America / Airline News / Airlines / In-Flight Entertainment / In-Flight Comfort / → All Tags

Virgin America Becomes The Airline For In-Flight Couch Potatoes

If you’re still aggravated from your Thanksgiving air travel, you better have gotten over it because round two begins this week. Hopefully your travel plans allow for the chance to book a trip on Virgin America, because they’re definitely the airline to fly for the holidays if all you want to do is stare at the TV and binge on goodies. Besides totally free WiFi through January 15 and power plugs at your feet, the airline lets you order plenty of snacks straight to your tray table.

Virgin America also has Red—that’s their in-flight entertainment system—and now they are upping the ante on their offerings. If you know your favorite show won’t be stored on the DVR at the grandparent’s house, you’ll be able to catch up on programs like Top Chef in the air. New channels being added including E!, Bravo, CBS, TNT, and CW—just in time for their new reality show.

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Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / In-flight Comfort / Movie Travel / Holiday Travel / → All Tags

The Movies You'll Most Likely Find On Your Holiday Flights

In an attempt to keep the spirit of Christmas alive in the skies, most airlines, including American, United and Delta, are currently offering a meager selection of holiday movies for your seatback entertainment. Four Christmases, starring Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn as a couple trying to get away from their families, and Elf, starring Will Ferrell as a man who is raised as an elf in the North Pole, seem to be this year's in-flight movies of choice. United is also playing Nothing Like The Holidays, a dramady about a family that reunites in Chicago for Christmas, on select international flights, but overall, its slim pickins' for holiday travelers this year.

If you're looking for some in-flight holiday cheer, the best bet may be to use Google's free WiFi and load up your PC with a selection of holiday classics before boarding your flight. Need some suggestions? Holiday Inn and Miracle on 34th Street are both Christmastime staples that are easy to get lost in, a major advantage when you're on a plane packed with stressed holiday travelers in the middle of flu season. If you're in need of a good laugh, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is a good option and not one that you'll see on TV a hundred times in the month of December. For rom-com fans, Love Actually has eight intertwining storylines that are sure to please. Not to mention, Hugh Grant is as charming as ever in the role of a bachelor Prime Minister who falls for a member of his staff. All of these movies are can be "rented" on iTunes for $2.99 or Netflix with a membership.

Related Stories:
· How Hectic Are Your Holiday Travel Plans? [Jaunted]
· How to Get Away This Christmas Without Offending Your Family [Jaunted]
· Airplane Coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: IMDb]

Tags: In-flight Entertainment / Continental / Airline News / Airlines / → All Tags

Continental Is Filling Their In-Flight Television With Loads Of Channels

Good in-flight entertainment can make even the most uncomfortable flight bearable. Even if it’s just a loop of a couple movies we’ve already seen, as long as there is something flickering on the back of the seat in front of us we’re pretty happy. That’s why we’ve been pretty eager to follow the progress of Continental Airlines’ installation of DirecTV service across much of their domestic fleet. Now, even before they’ve finished, they are already adding a few improvements.

Apparently not happy with an already awesome amount of channel offerings, they’re upping the ante with nearly 100 different channels. LiveTV, the company that supplies the TV magic, reached a deal with Viacom for some additional channels. That means Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, and MTV will all be yours for the viewing from the comfort of your middle seat. We’ll probably book flights for Tuesday evenings just so we won’t miss the double feature of The City and The Hills.

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Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / Technology / In-Flight Comfort / → All Tags

Your iPod Will Become The New Ultimate In-Flight Entertainment

Right along with in-flight wifi, the general range of in-flight entertianment continues to widen. A few months back, we summed up the current choices for IFE (in-flight entertainment) with our 2009 Airline In-Flight Entertainment Status Update, which included everything from full fleets boasting satellite television to those airlines where it's strictly "pack a word search book." Hopefully soon all airlines will have some option for bored passengers, and we think we found the best one:

The newest advance in IFE comes from Rockwell Collins, who have introduced the ability for passengers to hook up their iPods and other such personal media devices to a seat's entertainment system. This would enable you to watch the movies you've downloaded to your iPod via the larger screen on the seatback in front of you.

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Tags: Singapore Airlines / Airlines / Airline News / In-Flight Entertainment / → All Tags

Singapore Airlines Adds 1,000 Options To In-Flight Entertainment

Yesterday's Singapore Airlines news was all about that failed engine on their A380, which all things considered isn't the best press an airline can get. Today's Singapore Airlines news is the exact opposite, announcing a bevy of new in-flight entertainment options available to all passengers from first class to coach. As of Thursday, the airline will be rolling out a new version of KrisWorld, their system for providing passengers with on-demand options.

The new lineup is ambitious, includes over 1,000 on-demand offerings, and seems to have been in the works for a while. So it's not as if they're intentionally trying to diversify the Google News search for "Singapore Airlines." They're just lucky it worked out that way, and that the new programs really are worth a mention:

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Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / Continental / Airline News / Star Alliance / → All Tags

No Need For SkyMall, Continental Committing to In-Flight TV

There’s still a few months before Continental joins their new buddies in the Star Alliance, but they are already putting their new airline family to shame. US Airways and United are certainly not known for their in-flight entertainment offerings, but Continental is pushing forward to make a name for themselves when it comes to television in the sky.

The airline has finished installation of their new DirecTV service on 19 of their Boeing 737-900ER aircraft, which is a good start, but they’ve still got a lot of other planes to get through. They’re hoping to wrap things up by early 2011 on most of their domestic fleet. Just remember that you’ll have to pony up $6 to watch television from the comfort of your coach seat.

Apparently installing in-flight TV is way more expensive that adding the magic that is in-flight WiFi. The CEO of LiveTV reports that installation costs about $1 to $1.5 million per plane, while WiFi usually only costs between $100,000 and $250,000. The television entertainment system also adds about 1,000 pounds to the plane, which of course, costs more at the gas station.

We’ll keep you updated as to when you can ensure your next Continental flight has TV, but for now, keep last season’s 30 Rock ready to go on your iPod.

Related Stories:
· Continental Installing Live Satellite TV on Planes [USA Today]
· Continental Airlines - Status of DirecTV Installation [Official Site]
· Continental coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: athomson]

Tags: Seats / In-Flight Entertainment / Virgin America / RED / → All Tags

Virgin America is Aware of Super Poking; Recommends 'Light Tapping'

The other day we griped about the "super poking" that often goes on aboard flights with touchscreen seat back TVs, like on Virgin America, where cranky grandmas are nearly banging on the RED system to order their ginger ale and crackers.

But the folks at Virgin America are aware of the situation and are going to begin informing passengers that the "light-tapping" method works the best. Here's what they told Jaunted:

In response, our crews are now including a verbal advisory in-flight which notes that light tapping works best for the Red system interface.  This is also included in our in-flight “How to use Red” guide (see attached). 

We’re definitely monitoring this and hope as people get more acclimated to the system they can see that only the gentlest touch is needed to change channels, select movies, videogames, zoom your journey on Google Maps – or any of the other activities Red offers at every seatback.

We also have qwerty keyboards and a handset remote in every armrest that offers guests full control over Red if they’d prefer not to use the touch-screen.

Did ya hear that Grams? Light-tapping works the best. We'll even come back there and show you how to do it.  

Related Stories:
· The Problem With Seat Back TVs: A Different Kind of Super Poke [Jaunted]
· 2009 In-Flight Entertainment Status Update [Jaunted]

Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / Virgin America / Airline News / Shira Lazar / Travel Videos / → All Tags

The Day in the Cloud Challenge Was Um...Challenging

We were able to fly on Virgin America from LAX to SFO this morning for the airline's inaugural Day in the Cloud Challenge--the first-ever online puzzle challenge that can be played in the air and on the ground. We competed against another Virgin America flight using the GoGo in-flight WiFi (which was complimentary to all guests on VA flights today.)

GoGo's WiFi network was understandably overstressed this morning but once we were able to play the game, things did not get easier. These games are actually quite hard! And there was a very cool prize at stake. The two flights were vying to win a free netbook for everyone on the plane.

So how did it end up? Well, we were on the winning flight but we're still not sure how this game works.

Related Stories:
· 'Calling All Jeopardy Geniuses' For Virgin America's Impossible Trivia Game [Jaunted]

Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / Airline News / Virgin America / Southwest Airlines / Delta / Continental / American Airlines / US AIrways / United / → All Tags

2009 Airline In-Flight Entertainment Status Update

2009 has been the year when the US Domestic air carriers have really begun to step up their in-flight entertainment systems. We are no longer in the post-WWII era where airlines can cling to an occasional projector movie during longer flights. Furthermore, the CRT drop-down world is very close to extinction as well. These days seat back LCD screens and IFEC (c is for connectivity) are all the rage and most US airlines are expanding their offerings accordingly.

Of course, younger airlines with a smaller fleet have a built-in advantage here (fewer and newer planes), but that doesn't change the increasing demand from passengers for better, more reliable IFEC options. It could even be argued that customers are more likely to accept higher ancillary fees for things like extra luggage and pets if they can kick back with a killer IFEC on the flight.

Just this weekend we heard a JetBlue customer comment to her friend at baggage claim:

We sat on the tarmac for an hour at JFK, but by the time I watched three shows I was where I needed to be -- how can you beat that?

It seems in todays world, all delays might even be close to forgiven if you can get caught up on Jon and Kate Plus Eight while you wait.

Click here for our 2009 IFEC Chart and see how the airlines stack up against each other.

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Tags: In-Flight Entertainment / Continental / Airline News / → All Tags

Continental Must Think Slow And Steady Wins In-Flight Entertainment Race

While some airlines are declaring their dominance through amenities like in-flight WiFi, other airlines are a little behind the times. One such airline is Continental, which announced a rollout of DirecTV service on its domestic fleet back in 2008. Well, 2009 is almost halfway over, so we thought we’d check and see what’s been done—too bad we’re totally disappointed.

Fortunately, they’ve launched a pretty neat tracker where we can monitor their progress, or lack thereof. So far they’ve installed the seatback monitor service on 4 of 21 737-900ER aircraft, which according to their snazzy bar graph means they are only 1% complete overall. They are claiming these planes will be finished by September, with a couple other models finished by later this year. However, some won’t even be done until 2011, like their 757-300s.

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