News: ANA All Nippon Airlines are adding video on demand for all classes, and giving personal video screens in all cabins. The new AVOD in-flight entertainment system is mainly for its latest 777s, with iPod connectivity, in-seat shopping and meal ordering as well as premium cabin touchscreen consoles. It is based on Panasonic's eX2 technology.

Longhaul, ANA offer a full AVOD (Audio Video on demand) service of seatback entertainment in all classes. With this you can start, stop, and rewind films on demand.

Inflight Entertainment welcome screen

There are twelve main films, and 20 shorter TV programmes. These have a heavy US slant, even on routes to Europe, with a couple of cartoons, a National Geographic channel, and two ANA TV programmes (ANA Travel, and ANA Gourmet).

This sounds great - and don't get me wrong, its far better than ANA entertainment of old - but ANA's equipment can be a bit flakey. The main problems seem to be the touchscreens for use with Avod, which often doesn't recognise your touch: a fingernail sometimes gets a better response. It also seems to recognise just about anything brushing against it as touching the screen. So if you pause your film when the meal service comes around, you may suddenly find the film has started playing again.

Inflight Entertainment the nosewheel camera

Inflight Entertainment on an ANA Boeing 777-300 in business

There are quite a lot of games loaded into the AVOD, but they are very primitive, and if several of you on the same seat row play the games at one, the PC slows down and sometimes crashes. There is a nosewheel camera, which provides a stunning view as you come into land.

There are noise reducing headsets in business, while in economy there is a very simple headset with an overhead band, and two 3.5mm jacks.

Wingspan ANA's inflight magazine, found in the seatbacks

All Nippon Airways Inflight Magazine - Wingspan

You'll find two magazines in the seatbacks. wingspan, the usual inflight magazine, and Sky channel, which lists the TV programmes.

Wingspan is pretty good. There are the usual travel articles (to ANA destinations), section on shopping, a celebrity interview, and fleet information in the back. If you start reading the magazine from the back, you get it in Japanese, and English from the front.

Sky Channel ANA's inflight TV magazine

Sky Channel equally does a good competent job of showing you what films are on. The main programme gets pretty much a page of review. There are instructions for using the AVOD in the front, and CD listings in the back.