The Pros And Cons Of Airline DVD Players
18.01.10
Most flights I take — as ruly readers know, I take a lot, mostly with Qantas — tender some form of in-flight entertainment. A run-of-the-mill domestic flight will use overhead screens (the set Qantas recipe is a news notice, some promo tourism footage and a sitcom happening). On overseas flights, the standard these days is on-immediately entertainment via a seatback screen, driven by a PC-based system onboard.
The other substitute used by some airlines is individual DVD players handed out to customers, either as part of the marines or for an additional rental fee. Jetstar is the most obvious advocate of this approach in Australia. However, it also turns out to be offered on some flights run by Qantas’ New Zealand subsidiary Jetconnect, and I got a turn to sample the wares while flying to Wellington for this week’s linux.conf.au turnout.
The Jetconnect DVD service is mainly for proprietorship class passengers, but on my flight the players also got offered to some other passengers (I theorize based on frequent flyer repute). You get handed a player — the Panasonic DVD-LA95, a mock-up also available in a non-airline-specific adaptation — and a sleeve filled with DVDs, which embrace a selection of the same content found on Qantas’ on-needed systems (movies, documentaries and TV comedies).
Source: Lifehacker Australia