Yeah I have no doubt that if the upgrade did go surprisingly junior - like say 2007 or 2008 hires this time around - lots of people would adjust their bids on the next AE. I don't know exactly how the crystal ball works and nobody's given me a really good answer, but for my seniority (11600ish) it shows more people with a bid in for MSP 88B than NYC 88A, heh. In both cases, the total number ahead of me is higher than the sum of all those with that position as their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd choice. Does the crystal ball total number only look as far as the 5th choice or something?

As far as the computer question, there are 4 pieces of training you'll have to do in indoc & initial qual, current as of a few weeks ago:

1. Required HR training using LMS. This is online based and worked fine for me using Mac OS and Firefox - but not using Windows and IE9! Go figure.

2. Indoc memory stick. Takes 3-5 hours. Works in Windows ONLY.

3. Aircraft systems training on memory stick. Around 15 hours worth. Works in Windows ONLY.

4. Theater training on CD-ROM. About 1 hour. Works in Windows only.

The company is actually giving newhires with Macs a free copy of Windows 7. You can either buy Parallels / Fusion or similar to run Windows in conjunction with Mac OS, or use the Boot Camp utility (which comes with Mac OS X) to install it on a separate partition. Depending on which version of Mac OS you're running, the Boot Camp route can be a little tricky and a bit of computer/Mac knowledge is helpful. Parallels installation is more intuitive.

As for those that say Windows polluted their Mac, I personally went the Boot Camp route, and all the windows stuff is confined to the Windows partition on your hard drive. It's like having a separate computer; Windows can't even read the portion of your hard drive formatted for Mac OS. That said, the windows partition is going to take 20Gb *minimum,* 30 is better for a smooth-running install. IF that reduces the free space on your Mac partition to less than 20% of the total partition size, Mac OS X will run much more slowly due to the way it handles virtual memory. So let's say you have a 125Gb HDD with 90Gb already used, a 20Gb partition for windows will reduce your Mac partition to 105Gb with only 15Gb free, which will slow down Mac OS X a ton. So if you have a fairly small or relatively full HDD on your Mac, I'd upgrade that before coming to training. If you're running less than 4Gb RAM & especially if looking to run Parallels or Fusion, I'd also consider upgrading memory.

So far as not bringing a computer to training, it's doable, but you'll be spending time in the schoolhouse before/after class getting your training done. The hotel does have a few PCs in a training room they have set up for DL pilots, but the people in my class that tried to use them had trouble getting them to read the memory stick. So I'd personally bring whatever you have and try to make that work, and if it doesn't just plan on spending a few extra hours at the schoolhouse.