Subtle differences in P4

[John Locke]

is this only with the new firmware, when i kicked in sport mode with the "S" swtich it seemed to disable CA?

I'll try this again today, but yesterday, with Beginner mode off, the PAS switch did nothing when CA was enabled in the app. It flew very slow, and when I selected ATTI had GPS enabled and braking worked. Very weird. I had to open the window and turn off CA for the PAS switch to work, gaining Sport mode and ATTI.

UPDATE:
So I tried this again, different result. This time is worked great, as I was originally expecting. P mode enabled CA and S mode would take of fast. A mode was fine too. This is really weird because yesterday the PAS would not change from P mode whenever I had CA enabled in the app. Today it's working different.

Some notes, P mode would only get up to 15mph, S mode only did 40mph. I tried both direction passes, not even getting close to 44mph, but it's definitely faster than m P3 which topped out at about 33mph most the time, but took a while to get there.

 

[John Locke]

Vertical speed of P4 is 13mph, all the time, about 15-20% faster than P3. It has no governor for low voltage in the firmware like P3, which slows the P3 down from 11mph top vertical speed to 8mph after 3.6V is reached. I tested the P4 after reaching 3.6 volts (voltage font goes yellow) and it still shot up at 13mph, no problem.

 

[Kman]

I'll try this again today, but yesterday, with Beginner mode off, the PAS switch did nothing when CA was enabled in the app. It flew very slow, and when I selected ATTI had GPS enabled and braking worked. Very weird. I had to open the window and turn off CA for the PAS switch to work, gaining Sport mode and ATTI.

UPDATE:
So I tried this again, different result. This time is worked great, as I was originally expecting. P mode enabled CA and S mode would take of fast. A mode was fine too. This is really weird because yesterday the PAS would not change from P mode whenever I had CA enabled in the app. Today it's working different.

Some notes, P mode would only get up to 15mph, S mode only did 40mph. I tried both direction passes, not even getting close to 44mph, but it's definitely faster than m P3 which topped out at about 33mph most the time, but took a while to get there.

If you turn off CA, P-mode will be 35 mph (same as P3)

 

[John Locke]

Digital zoom video quality at 1080 is quite good at 2X zoom. However the actual zooming works just OK, not great but decent. Zooming in can gradually go from 1.0 to 1.1, to 1.2 and addtional .1 increments up to 2.0 by dual touching on the screen and spreading fingers to zoom. To zoom out, dual touch and pinch together. However zooming out is not as smooth, jumping from 2.0 to 1.5 as the first increment. I tried this many times, but it insists of jumping .5 down to 1.5. However, all increments are jerky, not appropriate for final videos. If you zoom while taking video, you'll need to edit out the zoom in and out parts, as they so jerky that it makes the video look cheap. I found the best method is to zoom in and out QUICK, so it goes from 1.0 to 2.0 instantly. During review that looks acceptable, an instant zoom.

 

[John Locke]

If you turn off CA, P-mode will be 35 mph (same as P3)

Yeah, thanks for reminding me. I did notice that with CA off. That's actually nice to keep the props out of the video view more because S mode is too touchy, the extreme angles of attach puts a lot of prop in the video, even with a sliver of horizon in the view so the camera is angled down about 15 degrees (my favorite camera angle). It's unlikely I'll use S mode much. P mode without CA will help to extend flight times while having a decent speed.

 

[John Locke]

How wrong was I? I had previously thought CA on/off was going to be a simple flick of the flight mode switch, as well. That does make it much less attractive, indeed. See, I figured you could be zipping along high speed, in Sport mode, and then flick it back to P to acquire CA. For me it's Boo. & I don't mean Casper...

RedHotPoker

You weren't wrong. My first flights yesterday we completely different than today. With CA enabled the PAS switch DOES in fact turn off CA and go fast with a flick of the switch to S, or A. I'm perplexed about my experience yesterday. The switch wouldn't turn off CA. I had to go into app to turn it off, then S mode would work. But today S mode work as expected, the switch makes it easy to turn CA on and off.

 

[RedHotPoker]

That does seem like a more reasonable safety aspect than madly henpecking around in the app, while blitz creging down wind, heading for disaster, searching for the tab to stab...
Yeah, flick a switch, and slam on the CA brakes.

RedHotPoker

 

[nhoover]

UPDATE:
So I tried this again, different result. This time is worked great, as I was originally expecting. P mode enabled CA and S mode would take of fast. A mode was fine too. This is really weird because yesterday the PAS would not change from P mode whenever I had CA enabled in the app. Today it's working different.

I only did 3 flights but that's how it worked for me - just as you would expect. I changed modes a ton of times and it always worked.

On the speed thing, in Sport mode and ATTI mode I was going between 42 and 52mph depending on with or against the wind. Nice. In P mode, I would say 22mph is the max, and you don't always get that and it takes a while to get even 20mph. Sport mode is good for flying but not so much for shooting. It is great to go from place to place much faster though.

 

[nhoover]

If you turn off CA, P-mode will be 35 mph (same as P3)

Oh - didn't know this! Thanks! That is great to have the option. Wish it was on the RC instead of buried in the app though.

 

[John Locke]

One of the significant differences between P3 and P4 is the Compass check for magnetic anomalies. With P3 we all looked at the MOD VALUE to be in the 1450 to 1600 range, indicating things are good to launch. With P4 you have to navigate down a couple of layers, clicking DRONE ICON> Advance settings > Sensors > then select Compass at the top (it defaults to IMU), then look for green on both compass integrity gauges, which means Excellent. Yellow means Good, and Red is POOR (don't launch). I'm out to jury on whether I'm a fan of this. The integrity gauges are OK, but I prefer seeing numbers. After the false readings from the P3 battery gauges, I can't trust DJI gauges, but that's just me. I would certainly like these integrity gauges to be more accessible instead of digging down through so many layers to get where I need to be. It would also be nice if it defaulted to COMPASS, since IMU calibrations are rarely needed. If you're new at flying Phantoms, good luck finding these gauges, they're important, that's why I posted this.

 

[John Locke]

One more subtle difference. Have you noticed in the DJI flight logger that logs your time and distances that with P4 it doesn't state your city location anymore? Mine says Map loading all the time. What's that all about? Have I got something set wrong?

Also, I noticed that when I registered my P4 with DJI, I dont recall seeing the opportunity to name my craft. Instead DJI put in some random characters and my email address. This is something DJI won't let me can't change (I think), which really ticks me off. Anyone else experience that, or did I just overlook this somehow?

 

[Kman]

One more subtle difference. Have you noticed in the DJI flight logger that logs your time and distances that with P4 it doesn't state your city location anymore? Mine says Map loading all the time. What's that all about? Have a got something set wrong?

Having the same issue. It's a DJI app issue.