American Airlines will be testing streaming video on two WiFi equipped airliners using the existing onboard GoGo system.  Apparently the GoGo system was robust enough to store this video and rather than be streamed from a ground location, the content will be stored onboard the aircraft and distributed via the onboard WiFi system.

I think wireless is a great idea for aircraft.  Weight is a fundamental issue on airplanes and WiFi allows this to be overcome in many cases.  However, I’m not so sure WiFi is ripe for this yet.  Streaming video is a bandwith hog even when sent to laptop devices (which in most cases can accept higher definition on screens that are often now as much as 17″.   What happens when 50 people stream video from the same system at the same time on the same WiFi system?

Ensuring robust enough servers is easy.  Ensuring robust enough WiFi is not.  If customers experience buffering delays, this will be an epic fail in the test.  Especially if they’re paying for this content.  While you can boost WiFi bandwith by streaming it on an “N” standard, “N” standard is still pretty new.  New laptop users will have it but not necessarily laptops that are as little as 3 years old.  Bandwith is still a problem to solve.

I hope this is relatively successful.  My instincts tell me that aircraft aren’t ready for streaming video via WiFi with the current technology.  At minimum, I think you may need to be using “N” standard for this.  In fact, the real solution might be a power outlet and an ethernet connection at every seat which is fundamentally cheaper and lighter than an entire IFE system at every seat.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax