alggag

I wonder how much analysis when into weighing Gogo vs. the row 44 regarding the additional fuel consumption caused by hump induced drag. I heard (from a non technical person admittedly) that planes with the hump offset much of the performance difference that was gained with winglets.

boettger1

Posting this from the MDW-PDX-SJC flight. Noticeably slower than MDW-SJC, but still very usable. Still $5 -- a great deal for 6+ hours of flight time. Also shows the flight time remaining in the banner. Cool.

MikeFromMKE

VPN data is always encrypted between the 2 endpoints (your computer and your works firewall) and therefor isn't supposed to be sniffable.

wlau

Of course you can tell it's VPN data. Packet header reflects so... their system just doesn't know how to detect or choose not to detect it.

bofc

It definitely makes me more productive to have wireless access on flights of any duration. I have found Southwest's wireless to be comparable to what I've seen on several other airlines re: speed, reliability, etc. However, if they don't equip more planes soon business flyer's patience will run out. If other airlines can all but guarantee wireless on their flight, why roll the dice if on board productivity is important?

Southwest could manage this emerging problem if they just communicated more about their plans. How many planes are wireless enabled now? How many will be in six months? When will the entire fleet be enabled? The silence on this topic can only make people wonder why it's taking so long and whether they are committed to a wireless fleet.

InkUnderNails

If nothing else, try to prioritize the equipped planes to certain routes. (Probably impossible the way they swap planes around.)

expert7700

During testing and until about 3 months ago, Wifi worked fast enough to stream video. I could have an remote desktop session open, download about 2GB of .ISO images, and upload about 200mb of ISO images.

The past several Wifi flights were another story:

Video: It'd buffer for 1 minute, play 4 seconds on 240p low quality, small window size.

Web sites would load after sometimes multiple attempts, but browsers say error loading page mutliple times.

Ping times 1500ms-2000ms to unable to reach host.

Downloading wasn't even attempted due to the slowdowns.

This could be due to more people using it, but walking down the aisle of the plane didn't seem to show many people on the internet. Maybe having more planes equipped is starting to cut down on service speeds?

I also remember reading that WN was going to stream sporting events (likely to save bandwidth so that you didn't have 137 (143 now) getting the same content individually. I wonder if that is affecting general wifi.

kennycrudup

I dunno, dude- going between SJC and SNA I've had great experiences (provided we weren't turning)- in fact, I'd forgotten to post how I was able to watch the 49ers rally back to beat the Aints in HD on my Slingplayer this last Saturday on WN2528 w/o a single stutter.

tusphotog

Same here. Watched a Sharks game on my Slingplayer earlier this month on my SNA-LAS-TUS flight. Streamed in sparkling HD, nonetheless!

InkUnderNails

That's amazing! The three of you all got planes with WiFi?

Pardon me if I am skeptical.

tusphotog

I had wifi quite a bit in the fall. Of course, no flight was over 60 minutes. I've actually seen quite a few wifi planes recently. There were a lot in LAS when I was there after Christmas...

InkUnderNails

Oh, I see them. I just do not end up on them.

I hope my luck changes. I have three trips to the west coast in February.

kennycrudup

I'm averaging ~50% lately.

smmrfld

Average over the past few months of roughly weekly flights:

approx. 80% not wifi-equipped
approx. 20% wifi-equipped
approx. 50% of wifi-equipped planes actually had it operational

Net - about 10% of flights had working wifi. What a botched roll-out.

kennycrudup

... but as a counterpoint, a couple of my WiFi flights (incl. Saturday's 2528) had no placards nor announcement, yet the WiFi was up. I've gotten in the habit of looking for the zit thru the boarding gate's rampside door now.