Stat shot: Phones, tablets use airport Wi-Fi more than laptops

Smartphones and tablets now trump laptops for browsing at airport gates as the newer, more mobile devices use airport Wi-Fi more than traditional computers.

Wireless network provider Boingo Wireless notes that 58.9 percent of the total audience on its network in airports is made up of handsets and tablets, with the iPad alone accounting for 23.5 percent of these. While the recent growth of smartphone sales has surely contributed to this trend, Apple’s iPad may be just as big a factor; much of the mobile device growth Boingo has seen is from June 2010, or two months after the introduction of the original iPad.

In terms of smartphones, Apple’s iPhone is the most used device for Wi-Fi on Boingo’s airport network, with 42.1 percent of usage, or nearly four times as much as Android smartphones. Some other key takeaways:

Average megabytes per month used by mobile devices is now 211 MB, or nearly double the 114 MB used on average in May of 2009.
The corresponding megabytes used per minute is up as well: 0.89 MB vs 0.37 MB two years ago.
Network usage on mobile devices equaled that of laptops in airports just this past February, indicating the trend is continuing to accelerate.
While laptops outnumber mobile devices in terms of potential user audience by a factor of five, mobile devices now account for nearly 60 percent of Wi-Fi network usage.

I can remember wading through a sea of laptops while waiting for flights a few years back, but Boingo’s data roughly corresponds to what I see now: about half of those surfing the web at the gate are doing so on iPads and smartphones, with just an occasional sighting of an Android tablet.

I’m flying out this Sunday heading to our Mobilize event, and I’ll be sure to take a closer look at who’s using what while prepping for my flight. For the record, I’ll be packing my iPad for use in San Francisco, but I’m more likely to use my 7-inch Galaxy Tab at the gate and on the plane.

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IsoStick turns a flash stick into an optical drive

Imagine being on the road and having your laptop completely crash to the point that it’s not even usable. For many tasks, you might be able to turn to a smartphone or tablet to keep on working or browsing. But if you really need that laptop and don’t have some kind of backup plan to get it restored, you’re out of luck.

A new Kickstarter project called the IsoStick aims to change that with a small USB flash drive capable of re-installing your laptop’s operating system. HackADay found the project, which is a memory stick containing all of the software and drivers needed to essentially trick your laptop into thinking that the device is actually an optical drive, not a flash drive.

Tech savvy readers likely already know how to make a flash drive “bootable”, so the IsoStick isn’t necessarily for them. I’ve already created a flash-based boot drive with OS X 10.7 Lion, for example, even though the operating system installs a recovery partition on my Mac Book Air’s solid state disk drive. But for a mainstream consumer who doesn’t want to configure their own operating system backup plan by hand, the IsoStick would be handy.

This approach beats carrying a bunch of optical disks, and in some cases, a portable optical drive because it saves space and weight while mobile. A keyring keeps the IsoFlash on a belt, bag or keys and there’s a “read-only” button to keep images safe and sound. Aside from carrying a full operating system, I don’t see why any other software installs from CDs or DVDs could be transferred to the IsoStick in case a reinstall is needed for any reason.

The project will be funded if it raises at least $25,000 by August 22 and as of this writing, I see 54 backers committing a total of $7,716, so the IsoStick is off to a good start.

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