OESF Portables Forum
General Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: Prefect47 on April 21, 2004, 05:46:43 am
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Has anyone had any experience with using the Zaurus (Cxxx) while flying (more specifc, on American Airlines)? It seems like it shouldn\'t fall into the restricted (i.e. EM interference) category so long as you don\'t have any extension cards plugged in, but I just want to make sure. Don\'t want to get stuck on an transatlantic flight for 8+ hrs with nothing to do when I\'ve loaded up with ScummVM games, some videos and a good ebook or two...
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I\'ve used my Zaurus on transatlantic flights and internal US flights loads of times. Never had any problems or had any flight crew tell me to turn it off. At least one flight was American Airlines.
If people can use their laptops with airplane power adaptors without any problems I don\'t see why you couldn\'t use a small battery powered device. Just don\'t have a WiFi or Bluetooth CF card plugged in.
The last transatlantic flight I was on had terrible movies, so everyone had their laptops, power adapters and DVD collections out
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i used my 5500 on flights to/inside the US just after 9-11 and it was never a problem. I have recently been using my 860 on international flights to/from europe and the middle east. They asked me to turn it off during takeoff/landing - but let me work, watch my divx movies and read throughout the rest of the flight... Zauruses are by far the best flight toys, don\'t know how i would travel without one - and teenagers are so jealous when you have equilibrium or fight club streaming in FMV (or gnuboy) while they are stuck with their new ipods :-)
Plus, in europe most airports seem to have free/cheap wifi somewhere in the departure lounge... i never have time for duty free shopping anymore...
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Same here, I use my 5500 on flights ... but I don\'t think I\'ve flown American Airlines with it.
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I take it the scanners don\'t hurt the hardware? Or do you get some sort of hand inspection?
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I\'ve put mine right through the x-ray along with my laptop and never had a problem, just a little fasination from others as to what it is.
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Bah! I had a steward tell me that I couldn\'t use my digital camera during the flight because of the EM interference, and I was in the back row. The EM interference is just a new buzz word and many stewards/stewardices don\'t know enough about it to make an intellegent decision. I mean... comon\'! It\'s the AMPs your unit is using that causes the interference... and almost all new handheld devices use very few amps! The laptop I had in college 14 years ago... ok... THAT monster could very well have given EM interference to even the neighboring planes (J/K).. but everything else is just paranoia.
1 year ago I was on a plane that was hit by lightning!! Talk about EM interference! And yet the plane was still able to function normally.
In short, you may have stewardices that may ask you turn off your watch or even your pace maker during the flight in fear that you\'ll cause the plane to come falling out of the sky in a ball of flames... if that happens, just nod your head and then turn it back on when they\'re away. You can\'t blame them... they\'re simply ignorant.
...just my soap box. I feel better now.