In January, United Airlines announced that it would accelerate the implementation of Starlink across its fleet. At that time, the airline’s Vice President of Digital Technology, Grant Milstead, described it as enabling a “living room in the sky experience.” Recent information indicates how much better internet connections will be on one of the world’s largest airlines.
According to TechRadar, planes equipped with Starlink can provide internet speeds of up to 250 Mbps, 50 times faster than the current internet speeds available on flights. As a result, passengers can expect quicker access to their favorite streaming services, faster media downloads to their devices, and improved productivity for those who need to work while in the air.
Through its agreement with SpaceX, United aims to have Starlink installed across its fleet of 1,000 airplanes before the end of the year. The first plane with Starlink installed is officially operational, with others expected to follow soon.
Two notable aspects of the United-Starlink deal should excite travelers. First, United plans to offer Starlink service for free to anyone who is a MileagePlus member, in contrast to its current (and slower) service, which isn’t free.
Joining the basic United MileagePlus program is complimentary. You can sign up on the United Airlines website and earn and redeem miles.
Second, installing Starlink on aircraft seems straightforward due to the few necessary hardware components. As a result, United’s aim to have Starlink equipped on its entire fleet within nine months sounds reasonable.
The system consists of a satellite antenna, two wireless access points, a power unit, and a power button in the cockpit. Except for the pilot button, the installation process is quite similar to installing Starlink systems in homes.
We expect United to begin advertising which of its plans has Starlink onboard when ticket purchases are made. Naturally, it should be heavily advertised once you enter a plane.
Many airlines worldwide are already offering Starlink on many of its planes or plan to do so. This includes Hawaiian Airlines, Air France, and Qatar Airways, among others.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Google DeepMind's AI world model Genie 4 can now build interactive worlds that you can explore and reshape as they run. It also generates ambient sounds, music, and dialogue that respond to your actions.
The new world model builds on Genie 3 with improved realism, more natural human movement, and better simulations of real-world physics. It could eventually help with everything from game development to training robots.
Apple has an incredible talent for making me admire its products while simultaneously questioning what on earth it's thinking with the pricing. This isn't even something as bizarre as a monitor stand, but the audacity for starting a new laptop lineup from $2,000 doesn't surprise me.
The newly announced 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 is just the latest to showcase this. The funny thing is, I already know that it's going to be a reliable workstation. You get a powerful new 2nm M6 processor, a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display, and up to 24 hours of battery life. We were impressed by the M5 MacBook Air, so the high-end M6 powered MacBook Pro definitely won't let us down.