One needs at least 2 ways to get mobile data, especially when going abroad. So often, the damned network one is on won’t roam.
One needs at least 2 ways to get weather, especially when using a dedicated website for a satellite phone. In fact the satphone itself is often dead.
One needs at least 2 ways to work out Eurocontrol routes (we have 2 now but for a few years there was only 1 – unless you paid a lot of money).
One needs at least 2 ways to navigate (fortunately Plan B doesn’t get tested too often on that one).
One needs at least 2 ways to file flight plans (Plan B does get tested quite often on that one).
We now have phones which do “everything” and that is a genuine step forward in “convergence” but one needs a backup for the phone too.
I am just wondering if, one day, all this IR crap will “just work”, in the way you can get into your VW or whatever, start it up, and it “just works”. I don’t think it will ever come.
Peter, I really don’t find I need two of everything. I use Rocketroute on my phone or tablet and the ADL-120 and they just work. Two ways to navigate is different. Of course there are alternatives like the Router on here but that is more a good alternative than a need.
Working* in high-availability IT, I only find it normal to have two of everything. That is to say, for those services that one really needs. Storage must be there at all times? OK, you have two storage cabinets, at physically separate locations, and synchronise them somehow. Same goes for database software and for routers and firewalls and what not. Eliminate SPoF*, remember?
The thing that should really worry us is the degree to which we all depend on the electronic gimmicks. How did Lindbergh ever fly from New York to Paris without a GPS? Yet he did. Even myself as a humble microlighter sometimes shudder at the frail netbook running my homebrew gps software, with a paper map as only backup.
Peter, I really don’t find I need two of everything.
I don’t need to do everything two ways either. Weather, Notams, flight plan filing etc. can be had at almost every airfield using ground lines. For working out IFR routes, there is always AIS via telephone, free of charge in many contries. A backup way of navigating is already bulit into every IFR capable aeroplane, and if that should fail too, I can always get radar vectors. For me, it works well as it is. And my company cellphone has worked flawlessly in every country I visited so far. But a second credit card can be useful sometimes…
Lindbergh did get across all right – the question is how many did not!
From the USA, you need to fly a wind-corrected heading within about 10 degrees to “hit” Ireland, and after that anywhere in Europe is trivial. And if you miss Ireland you are bound to hit the UK a bit later.
His biggest risk by far was engine failure, and probably flying into nasty wx.
For working out IFR routes, there is always AIS via telephone, free of charge in many contries
You must fly in a different universe to me, WN 
But then I must admit I rarely land in Germany.
I remember the day when Captaincy was eroded by HF radio; we still managed to fly around the World for several more decades without any IT let alone two of anything. Even a phone call home was difficult to get. Imagine asking for Pewsey 268 in the middle of Auz! Even a USAF VIP 707 couldn’t hack that one when they boasted they could get any number in the World in less than 2 minutes!
