Yet another newbie

[guardian87]

Hello all!

I hope that this is not a 100000000x repeating question
I am a total newbee in drone flying or any remote flying for that matter. I am now trying to do some research into what drone might be a "good fit" for someone like me.

Some requirements that I think are important

• I would like a little more flying time than the average 8 mins that I read about
• I want to be able to easily swap batteries
• First person view mode (can be optional as an addon later on, since i want to be able to fly withing visual range first)
• Some lights would be nice (just optical)
• Easy to find spareparts /extensions

I have some budget available, but of course I do think that it would be wise to start with a "normal" drone and not a golden one ;-)

All advises are very welcome!

Best regards

Guardian87

 

[dirkclod]

Hello all!

I hope that this is not a 100000000x repeating question

Guardian87

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... Welcome to the Forum Guard .
You will see many opinions now that ya ask
Mine will be P3S .

 

[DRCflyer]

Hi there,
Welcome along and thanks for asking.
I'm maybe not the best person to ask as I didn't choose the P3S, rather it chose me, as it were.
Won it in a competition!

What I would say is that I'm really glad that I ended up with a drone with proper GPS-assisted flying, stabilised gimbal and some form of Intelligent Flight mode for the simple reason that it gives me some confidence to let my kids fly it as well.
Would feel really lame saying 'no daddy has to fly this' while they watch on with sad faces. :-(

I know the real pros will scoff at the idea of not having to get your head around forward-becomes-backwards etc. but to me it makes the whole thing much less stressful.

Have fun.

Dave

 

[RF Guy]

OK, you may not want to hear this- but you should get some "stick time" before you put this much money in the air. Contrary to popular opinion, these things do not fly themselves. The way to do this is to buy a Hubsan X4-107b from Amazon or banggood.com (with extra batteries, lots of blades and bumper set. Total cost is $60 or so. It is a 4inch 6 axis drone that flys fantastically and it is near indestructible. Truthfully, you can get more fun flying time from this little trainer- than a Phantom 3. Why? Because you won't be afraid to fly it. Once you have hit the wall 200 times with the Hubsan, get a Phantom whatever and you'll have saved a lot of money in crashes. The hubsan will make you a crack drone pilot...

 

[J Dot]

I'm with ( Dirk, and DRC ) on the Phantom 3 Standard ( very good price ) and a great piece of machinery! Plus you can upgrade it later! That being said, I also agree with ( RFGUY ) as ORIENTATION, is your BEST, or WORST enemy!
Orientation:
With quad FACING AWAY from you ( right is right, left is left, forward is away from you, backwards is towards you ), now with quad FACING TOWARDS you ( right is left, left is right, forward is towards you, and back is away from you ) if you don't learn this, you will crash!
A cheaper quad ( there are hundreds under 100 dollars U.S. ) might be a good way to get used to flying, and orientation! Although the phantoms pretty much fly themselves, you can get messed up, turned around, panic, and ultimately crash your $800+ into the ground, tree, building, person, ect! The smaller quads are harder to fly, so if you learn on one, the more expensive phantom will be a breeze to fly!
I have a Phantom 2 vision ( non-plus ) I love it, but have dreams of a 3, basically the same thing with better goodies, and a nicer camera, gimbal! Definitely worth the price! And with guys like @dirkclod, and others around, that could help you in your travels, as those guys love to tear stuff apart, and make it AMAZING!
Good luck!

Take care, Fly safe!
Jerry
J Dot

Edited: Glad to have you as part of the family! WELCOME!

 

[RoyVa]

What ever you decide to get. Read the manual several times. Look at all the YouTube video about it until you get sick of looking at them. Learn about all the functions and its operation. Review all the FAA info and then tak short flights to get a feal of all the crafts operation. Set up Naza operation and test its functions. Be sure you learn and know how to get GPS satellite lock, set up you home lock and learn what you should not fly over. No people or 30,000 vehicles unless you have deep pockets. Just remember what goes up must definately come down... Somewhere. Never ever trust that your quad will never ever drop out of the sky, crash, or fly away. It's all a real possibility. When you least suspect it.... BAM!

 

[B- Scene Films]

If you come to a Phantom forum, you will get Phantom recommendations...

If you have never flown a quad before, I would highly recommend getting a small micro or nano quad. You can get a Dromida Kodo for $60 that includes everything you need and it has a little video camera in it to boot (http://www.amazon.com/Dromida-Kodo-...8&qid=1444663552&sr=1-1&keywords=dromida+kodo). Even cheaper (no camera) is a cheerson CX-10 ( http://www.amazon.com/Cheerson-2-4GHz-6-Axis-Quadcopter-Bright/dp/B00KXZC762 ).

These little quads are super durable and a cheap way to get into this field. They have no GPS so they require actual skill to fly. Once you get that, go here:

Quadcopter Flight School

Once you can do nose-in hover, fly figure 8 flat and banked, you should be ready to fly a Quad like the Phantom. What, you say? The Phantom has GPS and all kinds of automated systems to make flying a breeze! Why should you learn to fly a quad manually? Well, when that automation fails, you will have the skills to bring your bird home instead of waving goodbye to it.

That's just my opinion, I could be wrong