I think you mean A330s will be confined to the east coast (with IFE)? Yes, but as you say, they pretty much always have been. I think that if the older 330s were refitted with IFE, they would be fine for BOS/JFK, but possibly not ORD, which is still one of the longest A330-300 sectors. The next A333, for delivery for next June, is a higher gross weight model, so it shouldn't have a problem. I would assume it will probably be confined to the ORD route?
Interesting snippet in today's Sunday Business Post, about the Dubai route and new efforts to get new US access:
http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/s...790-qqqx=1.asp
The article says (at the end) that if Ireland is granted new routes to the US, it might have competitive consequences for other EU countries, but I would say that if the new US access is NOT granted, it would effectively amount to the imposition of a competitive advantage against EI; NO other EU country has a bilateral as insanely anti-competitive as ours; most other countries have pretty close to Open Skies (even the UK, despite Bermuda II is pretty liberal), so I can't see that being an excuse that will hold water.