While I love the concept of Aircell’s gogo in-flight internet service, I never really felt that the pricing made much sense.  It is too expensive on the shorter flights and since the vast majority of passengers are connecting the costs could really get out of hand in a hurry.  Aircell appears to have seen the light a bit and has announced a couple different alternate pricing options since the initial $13/$10 launch point. 

The latest pricing option seems to be a change for the $13 version.  Previously it was offered for flights greater than three hours in duration.  It is now being reported that as of July 15th the $13 option will be a 24-hour day pass.  That is great for folks with connections, day-trips or other similar schedules who will have multiple flights in a single day.  There is also the $50 monthly option that is available on either Delta or Virgin America.  Not sure why they can’t make the monthly good on all their systems regardless of the carrier but I’m willing to bet it has something to do with who gets paid how much for the subscription.

Both of these options, along with the $8 mobile device option are moving very much in the right direction of reasonable pricing for the service.  Hopefully the downward pressure on the pricing will continue and it will become a more reasonable opportunity.  Or I’ll just continue to read books on my Kindle (which I love) while listening to music that I bring on-board.  I do like the down time quite a bit.

Also interesting is the report over at Runway Girl about usage rates of the gogo service.  There are some who don’t see the long-term viability of the service.  And then there are carriers like Continental who are simply waiting to see some other carrier report profits from it before pursuing the technology.  In the mean time, Virgin America is reporting ~10-15% utilization of the service on average for its passengers.  That means somewhere between 15-20 users per flight, depending on the load factors they are seeing.  I find it hard to believe that they can be profitable at $300/flight in revenue.

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As part of a promo with Delta Gogo has introduced a promo code good for the next three weeks to provide a single half-price session on their in-flight internet service.

Save 50% on a single Gogo session (except segment pass and 24hr pass) until 7/19/2009. Use code 156FLYDA.
To Use your discount on a wi-fi session:
1) Select ‘gogoinflight’ as the wireless network and launch you browser
2) Sign in or click ‘Buy’ to create a new account
3) On ‘Payment Info’ page, enter promo code in space provide (code is case sensitive)
4) Click ‘Update Total’
Thank you! And Happy Travels,
Gogo Inflight Internet

This almost makes the cost of the service reasonable.

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CES 2009 had a ton of news come out of it, but nothing truly groundbreaking that I read.  Still, there were a few interesting nuggets worth looking at a bit more for their suitability to travel technology.

One such bit was a report coming out from Freescale suggesting that $400 is too much to pay for a NetBook device and that they had found a solution to drive the prices down even further.  They’ve got a new chipset that will sell at volume discount prices such that OEMs will be able to see units at $199 or $299.

There is a review (and a bunch of photos) of some prototypes at notebooks.com that suggests it is a pretty good physical design.  The pictures look an awfully lot like the Asus AspireOne shell, with the mouse buttons on the sides of the touchpad.

There is mention of the operating system – a stripped down Linux build – and also the limited application set supported – a web browser and video player, but nothing else and no ability to install more.  That’s a HUGE problem.  There have been many “internet appliances” before, and they all sucked because they were too limited.  The concept of the $199 NetBook seems destined to follow in that path, with their different/weaker chipset and limited OS.

Don’t get me wrong – I understand the value of pricing pressure on the products.  But manufacturers need to balance price against having something that is actually functional as more than just a web browser.  Sony is nuts thinking that a $900 NetBook is competitive, but at the same time, a $199 model that doesn’t do very much is a losing proposition.  Besides, paying $400 for one isn’t such a horrible price point, and there are plenty in the $300-350 range that are pretty functional.

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I’m a huge fan of the cellular WAN cards and the connectivity options that they provide.  Extending that access to a group of people was always a bit of work, but made it real easy to set up an office on the go or otherwise share the joy of being online. 

Novatel is addressing the complexities of the sharing with their new line of EvDO routers.  The device is a combination of a cellular WAN card and wireless router.  A single device to handle both the LAN and WAN halves of the connection.  Plus, it looks good.  It even runs on a battery rather than requiring a plug, so you can set up your own personal hotspot on the train.  I’m officially in lust.

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As noted in my previous post, I had the privilege to be one of the first people to test out Virgin America’s new inflight Wifi last weekend on a special test flight over San Francisco.

I got a chance to put the service through its paces – trying things like VoIP, email, chat, video, etc. Read on for my full review and some more pictures.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Virgin America is premiering their in-flight broadband internet access, which is powered by Gogo, this weekend. The service, which utilizes the Aircell network, will deliver broadband speeds at 35,000 feet, while in US airspace, allowing you to access the Internet using your Wifi-enabled laptop, PDA, or Smartphone, or through the inflight entertainment system. They plan to have the service available on all flights by the Spring of 2009, making them the first US carrier to have Wifi across their entire fleet. Preliminary pricing is set at $12.95 per flight, but this is subject to change.

Virgin plans to introduce the service during a special test flight this weekend, where they will be hosting what they claim is the “first-ever live air-to-ground video stream,” as a part of the YouTube Live streaming event. TravelTechTalk has been invited along to test out the service on the flight, and we’ll have a full rundown of the service, including speed and latency, coverage, and usability of various applications like IM and video chat, email, VoIP, VPN, and many more. We hope to be able to post preliminary reviews and photos live from the plane!

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Both Alaska and Southwest have previously announced plans to operate in-flight internet using a satellite-based solution from Row 44.  Now another player has finally launched service in the same space.  ViaSat will also be offering Ku-band satellite connectivity using pretty much the same technology as Row 44, including the same antenna provider.  And ViaSat doesn’t seem to have any commercial carriers signed up to partner with.  But they also don’t really seem to care about that.

They’ve inked a deal with Lufthansa’s Technik group to provide connectivity to private planes, including arriving as standard equipment on some models.  What does this mean to you?  Probably very little unless you’re in the market for a Bombardier Challenger 300.  But seeing another player in the in-flight broadband space is always a nice thing, as it means more opportunities for carriers to implement solutions and keep us connected on the go.

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If you have a phone with MicroSDHC expandability, then you’ll be pleased to hear that Sandisk are slowly shipping their first batches of 16GB cards.

You’ll be parting with about $100 of your hard earned cash, but you’ll certainly be one of the first on the block with this much storage. These cards should work in most Blackberry, Nokia and HTC devices with SDHC support.

I took the plunge and ordered one, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed it isn’t a fake/scam/broken/mistake. You’ll find them on Ebay or many retailers outside the US (apparently Sandisk has not shipped them to US retailers yet).

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HP just announced the newest entry in their Elitebook lineup; the new 6930p can be configured with several power saving features, which should make the machine capable of lasting 24 hours between charges.

By implementing an SSD drive, a special LED display and an ultra capacity battery, the boffins at HP may have finally delivered on the promise of all day computing. Of course, until the machine has been reviewed in a real life test, we’ll just have to take their word for it.

The Elitebook 6930p should be out by October, but no price has been revealed yet.

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Each week I’m going to pick several posts from the Flyertalk travel technology forum, and share them with you. Here are some of the highlights from the past week:

If you have ever wondered whether your VOIP box will work away from home, then you should read the real world experiences of fellow travelers in : Can I take my VOIP router overseas?

Signing up for a 2 year contract is like signing away part of your life. So someone asks the community: How to get a voice or data contract for less than 2 years.

And finally, one of the biggest pieces of browser news all year – Google chrome released – read from the perspective of a Flyertalker.

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