Can we talk about these new IFE panels that keep failing

Had three seat-back screens go dark on a 737-800 yesterday during preflight, all in the same row. Took me two hours to trace it back to a bad power supply in the overhead bin. Anyone else seeing more IFE issues with the newer installs?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_simon1mo agoMost Upvoted

Row 3 seat ive seen that same power supply go bad three times now.

susanb341mo ago

Used to swear by the old power supplies myself, but @the_simon's point about the same one failing three times actually hit home. Saw a similar issue in a different system where the new units kept tripping due to a bad ground in the rack. Changed my mind on blaming the hardware first.

jade5171mo ago

actually I gotta push back on this one a little. I've been working with these new IFE systems for about a year now and honestly the power supplies are WAY more reliable than the old ones. those older units used to fail constantly from heat buildup in the bins, but these new ones have built-in thermal protection that actually works. bad power supply in the overhead is pretty rare, more likely you had a loose connector or maybe a software glitch that needed a full power cycle. I've seen techs blame the power supply first without checking the simple stuff, and two hours trace seems like a bunch of wasted time. the seat-back screens themselves are actually better than the old ones too, they just need proper grounding or they do weird stuff.