Just to be clear, I wasn't making an endorsement, I was
just passing on
 the info FYI so to speak. I have used tablet computers
with conventional
 hard drives up to 17,000 ft with no problems. Your results
may vary.
 C. Smith

 That is interesting. Perhaps they have the problem solved.
 What brand? As I understand it the read write head
"flies" over the
 surface
 of the disk in ground effect. The theory is the air
density needs to be
 reasonable for this to happen. An airplane speeds up and
or increases
 the angle
 of attack to fly at higher altitudes to make up for the
lower air
 density.

 --------------------------------------------------------
 Here is a web site on the subject and a recent patent.
 http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/op/heads/op_Height.htm

 Lots of people want to use notebooks with moving map
software
 as it is 1/10 the cost of aviation moving map software.
 I wrote my own years ago and I used a floppy disk to store
 the FAA airport data base. :)

 The Home Built Glass Cockpit by Paul Lamar
 Kitplanes
 June 1988 page 69
 The future can be here now: electronic
 instrument displays in your homebuilt.

 Glass Cockpit: Part II by Paul Lamar
 Kitplanes
 January 1989 page 66
 Automatic position reporting could be helpful
 when pilot's hands and mind are full.

 Paul Lamar

I would think that some of the early sources of failure
would be in air
turbulence, hard landings and temperature extremes.
There are automotive and military rugged-ized versions.
Solid state drives can now be had for $100 or you can even
use a cheap
compact flash card as a IDE hard drive with a cheap
adapter.

Cheers
Cary

Tablet and smaller display were primary considerations, Mil-Spec
rugged duty was the second criteria for choosing the Itronix tablet
as a candidate for evaluation. Note again that solid state drives
were prohibitively expensive and slow just 3 years ago.
My sharing observations is for everyones benefit. I am pleased
to hear the other guys sharing experiences. After listening to
the reports, accelerated wear could be a factor difficult for
non-corporate resources to make a reasonable study, or short
term observation. Plus it's three years later, and a totaly
different technological horizon. The cost difference is now
minimal. I guess it's cheap insurance to pop $40-$50 and go solid.
C.Smith