Flew on a 737-800 from CMH to IAH this past weekend which was advertised by the gate agents as having "Live DirecTV service". I've flown on quite a few 737-900's before from LAS to IAH and EWR and have loved having the option to watch Fox Soccer Channel and Cartoon Network the whole way. This is not a complaint, but just rather a question seeking clarification.

On this particular flight from CMH to IAH, the "DirecTV service" offered consisted of 8 pre-programmed channels with syndicated episodes of various TV shows and some movies. It was certainly not live and did not provide access to every DirecTV channel (as the information card in the seat back pocket said).

So, my question is this... Are there two different versions of DirecTV programming available on the 737-900's and 737-800's or was this perhaps due to some sort of system outage? And if there are different versions of programming, is there any way to tell ahead of time which version will be offered on a given flight?

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Sounds like the plane you were on was only showing the stored content, not the live stuff off the satellite. It shouldn't be doing that in the lower 48 but I believe that they cannot change that setting once in the air.

Sounds like the system was malfunctioning. The crew probably chose to let it limp along rather than shut it down completely.

Do they still charge six bucks for it when it's on the pre-recorded content setting?

i wonder if the crew made a mistake with the settings?

Yes apparently they do still charge the $6 bucks for stored content only. I paid the fee on a flight from EWR to SEA and then discovered there was only a few movie channels and no live content.

I was in first, so I didn't have to pay. But, yeah, I believe they made an announcement about the $6 purchase in the main cabin.

Just a side-note as one who pays attention to schedules especially CO's, I do not even see a 737-800 operating out of CMH. Almost everything is RJ;s and 1 735, most of been an aircraft sub or planned operation. I see lots of aircraft sub's based on what the schedule says. I know weekends have alot of equipment changes.
It used to be years ago same aircraft type operated same routes 7 days a week. I know this is complex related to loads and maintenance requirments. I wished I worked in opertions, sounds like a interesting job.

IME through CMH, the last flight of the day from IAH is a 735, which turns to make the first flight from CMH-IAH the following morning. The few days I looked at now have the same pattern, with everything else being an RJ. I'd guess that the 738 was a late-swap.