DISQUS

Mark Guim · 1 year ago

Al that's really cool! I need to try this out!

Jay · 1 year ago

I tried the same thing with my N82 during the flight from Madrid to NY. It seemed that whenever the plane changes altitude the connection gets lost and that the best thing about it is taking pictures and geotagging them, also it's nice to see the planes speed and aprroximate time till destination on your N82 (assumming you geotagged JFK's location.
Here is one example of my geotagged in-flight picture: http://pt-br.zooomr.com/photos/a1745/4660142/.

onlife · 1 year ago

You seriously turned it off when the pilot said to turn off all electronic devices? Oh, you Americans are such slaves to authorities, even when they're wrong ... Over here in Europe, nobody cares for what the crew says about electronic devices. We just use them, 'cause we know it don't bother the plane. For example, what should a GPS-receiving device with flight mode on ever harm? Even the plane you were sitting in receives GPS signals, so what?

The European Union recently even cleared the way for normal mobile phone usage in planes, e.g. data and calls. If you want to see a lot of flights on sportstracker, set the workout type to flying and search for everybody, you'll find a whole lot of people doing this from start to landing :-)

dimitris · 1 year ago

Radio receivers also emit, or "leak", radio frequencies. So your GPS chip was likely emitting a - very low - signal. Since the frequency depends on the receiver architecture, there's no way to conclusively know that *all* receivers are safe to use in aircraft. That's the reason for the blanket prohibition of transmitters *and* receivers.

As to the EU regulation, if I remember correctly it is only supposed to be used with microcells installed on the plane which signal the mobile to transmit at its lowest setting. Plus, the frequencies are known/tested with the relevant avionics before they are allowed to be used on board.

So, Al, technically speaking, the Feds might want to have a word with you (not that I'd expect that to happen).

David Mc Nally · 1 year ago

@onlife: I believe one of the reasons for this is safety. Takeoff and landing is the part of a flight with the biggest risk of bad stuff happening, and you don't want 200 passengers with their iPods plugged in when you try to tell them to duck and grab their ankles.

Al Pavangkanan · 1 year ago

@onlife

I'd have loved to keep it on the entire trip. Wrong or not, the fear of being fined or jailed makes me behave and obey.

onlife · 1 year ago

Well, as long as they don't realize what you're doing, nobody cares anyway. And if they do, I don't mind to discuss - usually they give it up after a short discussion. Over here, you can only be jailed if you committed a crime, not if you just don't play by the civil rules of a civil company ...

Mike M · 1 year ago

Great article Al.