- Joined
- Mar 10, 2016
- Messages
- 322
- Reaction score
- 83
I flew about 12 missions with the latest firmware. I was mostly focused on repeating some Litchi waypoint missions with different camera settings that I had flown before with the older firmware. I also flew an Airspace follow me (Autopilot) mission.
There is one MAJOR difference in the video encoding. With the older firmware the UHD and 4K video recording bitrate was 60 megabits per second. The new firmware will only record at 1/2 that bitrate (30 megabits per second) which would require a significantly more LOSSY encoder setting. What a disappointment! No matter what other improvements may be in that firmware - this change is enough for me to go back to the older firmware. Jury is still out to see if that actually works....
A couple of other observations: I repeated a complex Litchi waypoint mission and found that while it flew the course fine, it had some erratic gimbal pitch adjustments during the flight that were not there before. As I noticed this with a simpler mission as well, I flew the simple one 3 times in a row. The erratic gimbal pitch movements were not consistent between the repeated missions. That is definitively not acceptable.
Finally, I flew the Autopilot Airspace follow me mission (following a fast, erratic object (my dog)). I noticed with this firmware, Autopilot appeared to have significantly more trouble keeping the subject framed. I've been testing this feature with the older firmware many times before. Every one of them was better!
Overall, I am very suspicious about this latest firmware version - so, heads up! Maybe it is best to keep the older version until we know more about this.
Meanwhile, the P3P has finished downgrading. A quick test confirms that 1) the downgrade is successful and working and 2) the video encoding bitrate is back to 60 megabits per second. I also noticed that the longest shutter on the older code is 1/30th while the newer camera code is 1/25th.
Oh well, now I have to start all over with camera settings. Clearly the codec settings have to be very different to accommodate 1/2 the bitrate. I don't want to start another "conspiracy theory", but I wonder about the P4 versus P3P camera and encoding quality. The claim is that the P4 is much better.... Is it because the P3P has just been handicapped with the new firmware?
There is one MAJOR difference in the video encoding. With the older firmware the UHD and 4K video recording bitrate was 60 megabits per second. The new firmware will only record at 1/2 that bitrate (30 megabits per second) which would require a significantly more LOSSY encoder setting. What a disappointment! No matter what other improvements may be in that firmware - this change is enough for me to go back to the older firmware. Jury is still out to see if that actually works....
A couple of other observations: I repeated a complex Litchi waypoint mission and found that while it flew the course fine, it had some erratic gimbal pitch adjustments during the flight that were not there before. As I noticed this with a simpler mission as well, I flew the simple one 3 times in a row. The erratic gimbal pitch movements were not consistent between the repeated missions. That is definitively not acceptable.
Finally, I flew the Autopilot Airspace follow me mission (following a fast, erratic object (my dog)). I noticed with this firmware, Autopilot appeared to have significantly more trouble keeping the subject framed. I've been testing this feature with the older firmware many times before. Every one of them was better!
Overall, I am very suspicious about this latest firmware version - so, heads up! Maybe it is best to keep the older version until we know more about this.
Meanwhile, the P3P has finished downgrading. A quick test confirms that 1) the downgrade is successful and working and 2) the video encoding bitrate is back to 60 megabits per second. I also noticed that the longest shutter on the older code is 1/30th while the newer camera code is 1/25th.
Oh well, now I have to start all over with camera settings. Clearly the codec settings have to be very different to accommodate 1/2 the bitrate. I don't want to start another "conspiracy theory", but I wonder about the P4 versus P3P camera and encoding quality. The claim is that the P4 is much better.... Is it because the P3P has just been handicapped with the new firmware?
