So been doing quite a bit of flying lately, both overseas and domestic, and have been getting frustrated by the lack of in flight maps on the new xm'ed aircraft. I always have a fun time matching visual cues out the window with the actual map.

I remember last year people saying that they were "testing" the maps on the CRJ's and they would be done by the fall but haven't heard anything. Is it even being worked on? How much testing needs to be done?

Anyone heard any news/updates???

i flew about a month ago from montreal to winnipeg on a CRJ-700, and while i never checked mine for any length of time, someone across the aisle had theirs set to the map. It would cut in and out between a map and some unavailable type of message(obviously wasnt working right). And From the looks of it, it didnt look that great. Imagine looking at a globe with an airplane flying above it. It wasnt an airplane image overtop looking straight down on a 2D map. It seemed it would have been kind of difficult to picture exactly what you were flying over with the way the map worked.

Doesn't sound too reasurring, hopefully they'll get it working soon. I'd hope the map has some moderate level of detail like the old in flight maps.

don't get me wrong, the graphic that was there was a very well done graphic, it just really isn't what i would want if i wanted to try and find out what we were flying over.

The software upgrade that included (amongst other things) the moving map feature is causing stability issues with the system. The manufacturer has been on site since late November to try to rectify a series of problems. On December 12th, the President & C.E.O. of Thales Avionics issued a written apology to all In-Flight crews for the problems currently occurring with their system.

I have been contacted by Thales to provide them with the ARINC 429 protocol data that the Bus' use out of the FMGEC / ADIRU, etc...

Strange since on the Airbus the labels are the same for the Passenger Visual Information System on most our aircraft.

They have almost the same system on Etihad and the ASXI (the new name of the moving map) works fine over there, and it kicks some serious a**.

Unfortunately, due to the mixed fleet at ACA (Embraer, airbus and Boeing), they have difficulties merging the S/W into one working solution.

Weird, I would have thought that the software wasn't not plane dependant and just an internal system installed in the cabin. Like installing tv's and a dvd player (but not that simple of course)