I have heard a lot about the Apple apps store and all the things that can be done on an iphone but I sort of just glossed over them until last night at Walmart when Kelli and I were looking at a device called iPod touch 3rd Generation.  The display showed a weather icon on the home page and I thought "How can they do that without a phone?"  So I came home and went searching at apple.com and cnet.com and learned that the 32 and 64 gig versions of the newest iPod have built-in WiFi.

Back to Wally World Kelli raced to spend $315 on a 32 gig iPod Touch.  The photos show just one weather tool that comes with the device.  Kelli tells me that we can buy an accuweather app and a ski condition app and all sorts of other apps from the apple app store.  Granted you can't get updates w/o a WiFi connection but there are all kinds of places now-a-days that have free public WiFi access on the way to the airport so a pilot can get a new weather update without an expensive data contract required to have the same apps on an iPhone.  The device is smart in-that it remembers all WiFi addresses and passwords and can seamlessly connect to get updates after the first sign-on per address.

Thusly, this morning I just turned on the device, touched the weather icon and when it opened it showed yesterday's weather for a couple seconds and then "poof" it updated to today's weekly forcast without any interaction on my part.

Plus the thing holds like 7000 songs!

Photos show relative size.

CR

I have been using Pilot MyCast on my phones probably close to 5 years now and have been very happy with it.

Uhhh - 9 degrees?!!  NINE DEGREES!!???  Like, one less than 10?!  Jeepers, that's COLD!  I guess saying that the whole idea is "cool" violates some kind of rules....



Richard

i use 1800 wx brief on my phone for wheather reports

I have the iphone and a couple of other apps that are very flying friendly. GPS cockpit, Skycharts, and TFRs. Gps cockpit has the standard 6pack that are all fired from the GPS and the 3 axis accelerometer thats already onboard the iphone. Skycharts is just that, a moving map sectional that has basic flight planning functions to one leg. TFRs is just that, a link to current TFRs with a map overlay and text if you want to sort thru the words.

The GPS cockpit is mostly useless because the instruments are too small for me to see. Skycharts is the cats meow and costs about 10 bucks but updates free and the update interval is the same as paper sectionals and also lets you zoom in. It's especially handy for flying in the DFW metro area.

I'm not a big Apple computer fan but I think they finally found what they do best, make phones. I haven't found one to compare and have been trying since my first one in aug 2008. BTW i have about 1000 songs and 7 full length movies on it and still have about 8g of memory left on a 16g unit. I also have dual level pro, which is a very functional setup tool, check it out.

Dennis

Don't want to throw a blanket on the fire, but before you guys all rush out and lay down 300 bucks for an iTouch, I got one as a gift and struggle to find a use for it. I have no convenient Wi-Fi networks to log on to. Had no success getting my desktop to configure an add-in Wi-Fi card so I could connect at home. 98% of the "apps" available on iTunes are absolutely useless or poorly written, assuming you even have the patience to wade, page-by-page through the badly-designed iTunes interface just to see what's available (the search window searches ALL iTunes store categories - not just the apps). It does act as an iPod, but it's operation is more cumbersome than the iPod's. It has no phone. It has no camera. If you were desperate, you could try to view a movie or read a book on it. I did purchase the AIM for mine. It's nice to think you can have it in your pocket for reference at the field, but you get over that when you see how constraining it can be to read the small screen. This has to be one of the coolest and most useless toys ever invented. If it wasn't a gift I would be glad to offer it up here for a song.

I might just be old school, but I simply call 1-800-WX Brief before I go flying. That way I get "official information" and there won't be any question that I "received" that info should a situation arise. And my laptop covers any other things as from weather to the ETLB website!  

just throwing this out there, but xm radio has a weather option which looks slipromising... i'm not sure what receiver it requires though...

Not sure if this is what you were talking about from XM.  They just raised my price $5 each month so its about 37 bucks each month but it is worth it for my job and I keep it plugged in when home too so it runs 24/7.

http://www.lonesomebuzzards.com/cgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl?m-1258227259/

CR

Our club members use this website both at home and on the cell phones with internet capability.  Just pick you state and local airport from the drop down menus....gives you a three day forecast broken down into time zones also.  Great website for light aircraft and PPC flying.

http://usairnet.com/cgi-bin/la.....bmit=Change+Location

Tim A.

Quoted from firepilot1 Our club members use this website both at home and on the cell phones with internet capability.  Just pick you state and local airport from the drop down menus....gives you a three day forecast broken down into time zones also.  Great website for light aircraft and PPC flying. http://usairnet.com/cgi-bin/la.....bmit=Change+Location Tim A.

Tim,
Thats the same site I use and I find it to be very accurate.

Quoted from CrazyRob Not sure if this is what you were talking about from XM.  They just raised my price $5 each month so its about 37 bucks each month but it is worth it for my job and I keep it plugged in when home too so it runs 24/7. http://www.lonesomebuzzards.com/cgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl?m-1258227259/ CR

that's the weather thing i was talking about, i have a bushnell handheld gps with xm capabilities, hoping to use it once i get flying...