Other than damaging a prop from it hitting a blade of grass on landing it is in perfect shape. Yes, they are so fragile I landed very smoothly in the grass and soft grass is enough to damage the props!
I don't fly it as much as I used to. These new ones are certainly an engineering marvel with how much they have added and still kept it under 249g.
The big one to me though is the wind resistance. 10.7m/s is 23mph. The original specs 17mph. It is hard to say at which point it starts having trouble, but 23mph is a non-trivial improvement, it probably means 2x as many days you can actually fly.
Now the things that suck about DJI, and I wonder if they are actually at all improved with a new drone:
- Geofencing sometimes locks you out of legal flights, no way around that unless you can jailbreak
- Some legal flights require you going through an unlock process, and if the DJI web infrastructure is having a bad day you also get locked out of flying in a legal place
I would probably buy from another competitor, especially a US one, just over the unlock experience with DJI.
https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/270608...
I checked your source and it didn’t back up this claim.
I’m not a networking specialist but isn’t it possible to detect if something is transmitting a massive amount of data (such as video) to an undetermined destination?
seems like this type of blatant data export would be easy to detect and subsequently ban the device doing it.
I’m just a simple software developer, so the network stuff can go over my head sometimes (heh), but the claim that such a large amount of data is being transmitted in a way that couldn’t be confirmed enough to ban the product seems dubious.
There are far more obvious reasons for that. These drones are of enormous military value. By buying them, US consumers are funding an obvious foreign military hardware production. US money may well be funding production of drones which may once be used to correct artillery strikes on Los Angeles.
DJI are particular seem to work in concert with "military civilian fusion," and have hardware, and software to defeat both very serious jamming, and attempts to fry its radio with pulsed microwaves. Military jammers for 2.4g band seemingly have near 0 effect.
Meanwhile in the US...
It's a good thing the new ones have collision avoidance, it could likely have saved mine back then. I'll someday get one of the newer ones, it was pretty fun and an impressive piece of engineering. Sometimes I think to myself "this would be a really great shot with the drone", or wish I had it to scout some terrain ahead when hiking or exploring. It's a pretty cool gadget!
It was hard not to chuckle.
RIP.
There are no US or European drones that really come close, unfortunately. Parrot are 2-3+ generations behind DJI in terms of capability: wireless link, camera, and even basic flight stability are all quite a distance behind. Skydio had unique autonomy capabilities which were really cool but were a long way behind in controller capability, camera, and wireless tech and exited the consumer market.
Honestly, DJI no-fly zones in the US are not too onerous in my opinion - most of the places that are banned probably should be banned. I would recommend a DJI drone with a standalone remote (to avoid needing to install DJI apps on your phone). However, generally speaking in Europe their no fly zones are more restrictive and can be quite frustrating.
That’s a huge one for me as well (also own a mini). I live near the sea and the number of days you can actually fly is surprisingly low. 23mph is still pretty low, but I understand the weight vs windspeed tradeoff.
The first few props were super brittle and shattered at the slightest botched landing. I also think they were poorly designed with no fillets, so the stresses would concentrate at the base of the blades and the plastic would crack.
A bought another couple of bags of props, and they were MUCH higher quality. Often I can just bend a blade back after a rough crash landing.
A few years ago, assuming you had been willing to pay more for something worse but for ideological reasons (like you would buy a Fairphone, I totally get that), I would have adviced for an Anafi. But now the Anafi AI and Anafi USA are a lot more expensive, that's not for consumers anymore IMHO.
As a company, if you cannot go for DJI, then the alternatives to Mavic are Parrot Anafi and Skydio, I guess. For the bigger drones (like the Matrice series), honestly it's hard. Just be prepared to pay a lot more for a much worse product.
It's a fun toy, but can't stand the wind at all, so it's a bit nerve wracking to fly it over open water if it's not completely calm :D
I really do want the Mini 4 Pro, but can't justify the 1000€+ price tag with the proper controller.
What happens if you turn off your cellular data (or are simply out of reception) ? Does it let you fly it anywhere then?
In Australia and the Canadian Arctic I basically never had reception, and it never cared once.
He also sneers at licensing, jailbreaking, geofencing, etc.
I notice that there aren't any pictures that actually show people in close proximity to the drone. The "drone in hand" picture looks photoshopped, so I assume the drone is actually not-so-mini. I have a teeny-tiny drone, about half the size of a sparrow. It doesn't have cameras, though.
The DJI Mini drones are very compact. The DJI Air 3 is arguably the next level up in the lineup, and it weighs 3x as much and is noticeably larger. The "teeny-tiny drone" you're describing just doesn't sound comparable or particularly useful.
Folded (without propellers): 148×94×64 mm (L×W×H)
Unfolded (with propellers): 298×373×101 mm (L×W×H)
It is what it is. This chap exists, and I talk to him, almost every day. He has a great deal of enthusiasm, and does interesting work. I am sure his approach is quite common, in the HN crowd.
My friend is not your typical DJI customer, and his approach is no threat to them. People like him have always been around. It’s like people that mod cars. They don’t threaten the mainstream.
But the reaction seems to have been quite defensive.
However, other actors are entering the war business, like Parrot[4].
[0]: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NtgseODXGSAomx6G5Efw...
[1]: https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/02/16/ukraine-russia-war-dron...
[2]: https://www.dji.com/uk/newsroom/news/dji-statement-on-sales-...
[3]: https://www.dji.com/newsroom/news/dji-statement-on-dji-relat...
[4]: https://www.lesechos.fr/weekend/high-tech-auto/henry-seydoux...
This claim is always thrown out like a life preserver without ever anything to back it up. Do you have anything to support this claim?
I guess the Android version could be a lot different, but why?
You don't need camera access, location services, etc when the drone does all of it onboard.
I got a mavic early on and sent it back because you needed the app and an account to activate it and fly it, even manually.
I had the original Mavic Mini and installed the DJI Fly App (v1.2.1 on my phone now) from the Play Store.
edit: here's the listing: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=dji.go.v5
Though it doesn't show up in search from the web.
edit 2: The Android download on their site is definitely an APK and not a Play Store link: https://www.dji.com/downloads/djiapp/dji-fly
Why in the world would they need to do this?
I think the real issue is more complicated than that, but, whatever.
I use their software only for administrative tasks - updates, etc. For routine use I would recommend something like Litchi.
I thought that was because the company was sanctioned by the US, and therefore google can't work with them?
The Play Store has all kind of automated and manual processes to detect malware and vulnerabilities. It's why I don't enable side-loading on my phone.
Do it after someone dies: "Why didn't you do anything?!"
It's not insane to get out in front of drone regulation; their numbers are likely to continue to increase. Lack of regulation certainly isn't DJI's advantage; they still have to comply with it to sell their product in a whole bunch of major markets. That's the exact reason this drone weighs 249 grams.
Nor is it surprising. There are a lot of regulations around aviation (though perhaps not as many as there are in other places) and safety is the reason. Every flying object in the sky is sharing the space with commercial airliners, hobbyist pilots, logistics companies, government aircraft, etc. All of which share the same regulations or have specific ones depending on the industry. It makes sense that drones would be regulated as well.
See the other reply upthread with respect to line of sight ("You're not allowed to use binoculars.") If true, that's stupid and unnecessary.
If it's consumer marker where less cost matters a lot, there won't be a US competitor. DJI has home-turf, scale, and first mover advantage there, and a US competitor can maaybe match DJI in price.
In technology/autonomy? Skydio beat them years ago (https://www.skydio.com/). They launched as a consumer drone but I guess recently realized how consumer market in west isn't as profitable as enterprise/defense market so they shut down their consumer division. Skydio founders were pioneers in autonomous aerial vehicles, and it's not surprising they beat everyone else in autonomy. When they launched their first drone a few years ago, they were doing outdoor vision based autonomy for drone using on board compute only - it's an insanely hard problem, especially when you want to do in reliably in a product and not in a lab setting for nice videos. They did it and blew everyone away. DJI fan boys will say 'oh but DJI had autonomy too'. No they didn't, at best they had feedback based obstacle avoidance.
I often tell my friends, one of my biggest regret was not signing up for an internship at Skydio back in 2018. They came to UIUC for recruiting, and they didn't realize their product yet. Back then I was a dumb first year grad student, I didn't check the founders background, and naively thought it was yet another dumb drone company trying to get some VC money by pitching something they'd obviously fail it. I've never been so wrong.
In technology, hell no.
Admittedly, Skydio had this pretty good VSLAM a few years ago. Still their drone was pretty useless in most use-cases where you would have taken a DJI. In many situations you don't really need more than "sense-and-avoid". Don't under-estimate DJI. The day VSLAM is important, they may have it much faster than you think.
It's a common mistake in the West to think that "we are better at technology than China". In the drone industry, we are years behind. And because of the technology, not because of the production cost.
> I've never been so wrong.
Well they have been struggling like the rest of the Western drone industry, it's not exactly a serious competitor to DJI. I would say that back in the days, Parrot was more successful than Skydio ever was. Since then I would think that the Anafi competes with Skydio (again they don't have the Skydio VSLAM, but who most use-cases don't need that).
Subsidies and regulation played a major role here, although probably not the same kinds the parent post is whining about.
The US government and enterprise market requires drones which are compatible with US Federal requirements ("Blue UAS") as well as state-by-state bans on DJI drones. It's a lot easier to compete in a space where your primary competition is being made illegal.
GoPro started IIRC as a company that just branded cameras they ordered from overseas.
What about zipline? There's also some other startups focusing more on use of drones rather than building drones from ground-up.
DJI is a video camera company that happens to put the cameras on drones.
To be honest, we were far, far behind DJI waaaaay before we started talking about regulation and legislation. And since then we have not really been catching up at all.
Anyone own one? What do you use it for?
- It's OK to fly there and you're not going to annoy anyone
- You can get some interesting photos.
Having previously flow R/C airplanes and aircraft drones like DJI makes are not actually that entertaining to fly, they are too easy and not that engaging.
So it's all about the photos. You'll see new people flying at a park or something, but after a while you're basically thinking the park is not a very interesting thing to take pictures of.
This is very much an opinion. I have way more fun with my Air 2 than with any RC plane I've had.
If you never really cared about RC planes and don't do photography/videography fairly seriously, I guess you won't suddenly find a new passion in drones.
* Fun Flights * Aerial photography of yard projects * Towing fishing lures way beyond furthest castable distance * Fireworks videos * Hiking Scouting * Surveillance drone ( Caught some motorbikers trespassing on property and tracked them back to house ) * Firewatch * Pester folks safely from patio
Even so, it’s incredible to get so much perspective. I’ve learned so much about the places we visit from the aerial footage. The videos my son makes are pretty cool, too. Overall I wouldn’t expect one to be life changingly awesome, but I’m glad we got it.
I am not yet sure if this one has the appropriate way-point features, I think I am going to go with the Air 3 despite the higher price tag because it's more robust and I need a license to operate a drone for this purpose anyway in my jurisdiction (Thailand).
Then decide if they want to break or follow the law. Most people not wanting to break the law will let the drone collect dust after a handful of use, those that break the law will eventually lost it at some point or get bored.
I think the only people who really keep using them are travel vloggers and they have sometimes issues at border control and usually need to ask permissions and pay taxes to be able to fly and record stuff near a particular place. Usually they only get permission because they are well known and would boost tourism.
It's for extremely small drones (65-85mm from diagonal motor posts) which are great for flying indoors or in small areas.
The main issues being:
1. It's still very much a "hobby" hobby. You can get some ready to fly kits, but even then it can wind up more technical than you expect.
2. They're spec'd for the niche market, meaning quite powerful and very short fly times, which is a shame. One of my favorite drones is the Potensic A 20. A durdly little thing that can fly easily for 10 minutes on brushed motors, but it's not really built to last (or god forbid crash). I'd KILL for a "A20+" which is just low power brushed motors and nicer controls. It's on my todo list to see if i can cobble something together whenever I have real life time again.
To be clear, it's still pretty easy to get into. I have the beta cestus as a decent rtf kit, although beta has some battery connectors that sorta lock you in (they are supposedly better than others though and you can convert things...but there's the hobby part again), and there's been other half decent ready to fly kits over the years.
Here’s my latest video:
And a couple more that I’m happy with:
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CsMqtYXICju/?igshid=MWZjMTM2O...
https://www.instagram.com/reel/Crss_afoG0a/?igshid=MWZjMTM2O...
The roof is at the 3rd floor and the ground is a bit uneven there so it's not just that I'm lazy ok?
It's picture quality is amazing and it's fun to check caves in the mountains and possible paths before going them. Also more advanced travel selfies are fun.
I don't use it when many people are around, so that would highly limit it in some places for me.
Because they're tools for filming. I don't think people need to buy these as a toy.
On the other hand I can imagine using drone with Lidar mapping (on private property).
I've flown one hundreds of times and other than other drone owners no one has ever said a thing or noticed. The drone owners notice and come over to talk drones.
My biggest crowd are children and pets. They always seem to be amused by the drone.
I read over their product page and, like always, I'm absolutely amazed that these things exist now and can capture such amazing video and photography at their price point. I'd love to get one to use.
But I won't buy one, because every time I go out now to the beach or on a hike, I see people with things like these and I just cannot stand them. I hate the ridiculous noise, I hate the fact that these people are filming things in the middle of streets and sidewalks and trails and generally putting themselves in the center of everything and inconveniencing everyone else just to 'get their shot'. I hate the idea that I am potentially being filmed by some random kids with a high speed camera on the drone hovering out over the park bench I'm resting on.
And because I hate these things, I will not buy one, because I do not want to turn into the annoyances that I feel, no matter how cool the tech looks.
That... or... I'm secretly afraid that I'd buy it and not actually have anything cool to film and it'd sit in a closet and be another $800 paperweight device.
But let's go with not wanting to be an another annoying 'Main Character Syndrome' person and just be quiet and peaceful when out and about.
Mini 2's are quiet enough and much of the hostility against their use is rooted in prejudice and a little bit of hysteria.
it plays both ways
Communicating with a drone up in the sky is easier than something like your WiFi or your cell phone because you have a nice, clear line of sight to the drone. Fly behind a hill, building, or some trees at distance and the drone will lose connection and go into safety mode.
The free space path loss at 20kM is 126dB at 2.4GHz in perfect conditions, or 134dB at 5.8GHz. If you start with the 1 Watt nominally allowed by regulations, that's +30dBm. Subtract 126dB and you're left with -96dBm. That's a weak signal, but it's actually close to the receive sensitivity of the WiFi card in your laptop, believe it or not. I would guess the DJI gear uses narrower channels than WiFi to achieve a better noise floor than the 20MHz (or wider) channels you get with WiFi.
The 20km figure is really an extreme upper limit. Realistically you'd probably need a high-gain antenna pointed in the direction of the drone to achieve it.
For instance: where do you get that "the free space path loss at 20kM is 126dB at 2.4GHz in perfect conditions, or 134dB at 5.8GHz"? And why does 1 Watt translate to +30dBm?
I suspect military communications uses wattage MUCH stronger than what's allowed by regulation in the battle space, correct?
This is a major advantage DJI and other Chinese drone makers have over US based ones. Technically acquiring an SDR/DSP implemented LTE baseband is not a major difficulty. Getting Qualcomm to let you is quite a challenge.
Looking at FCC listings and product pages you can tell that DJI are also throwing power at the problem. The EIRP on DJI devices is very high. They go up to 33dBm (2W EIRP) on the most modern devices like the Mini 4 Pro.
Is it using LTE bands? Or just LTE technology on non-licensed bands?
The mini 3 pro has a CE regulations claimed range of 8 km, but after 2.5 km I pretty much loose connection. If I turn the drone to face my direction, I might be able to fly it a bit further, but at this point it is so hard to control it, that there is no point.
Btw, according to regulations, you can not fly it without line of sight. So, in practice the "legal" range is a few hundrend meters. I have yet to see an observer with binoculars. :)
I've flown the original DJI Mavic Pro to about 4-5km multiple times and never had any real issue with the video feed.
I'd be surprised if this much newer gen is worse.
Most wireless transmission technology lives somewhere in-between the extremes of the above spectrum. Signals analysis is quite advanced and codecs/encodings are also quite advanced at this point.
In reality you will see about a 2km max in relatively clear conditions, and as few as half a km in even normal suburban/urban conditions.
What are they waiting for?
"The drones lie in wait silently. The sun dips over the horizon. A lone IR led comes to life on the robots face. It is done waiting. It's prey is beckoning."
The DJI Mini 2 SE is $339 at most stores.
I want something that can autonomously follow me on my mountain bike or follow my RC car as it goes over jumps for under $500.
In a mountain bike scenario, the drone is mostly capturing you on the side and it is moving sideways itself. So, unless you want to fly it next to the sea, you want to have sideways obstacle detection. Or, just have a friend control it. :)
That said, I'm starting to lean towards spending the extra money to pick up the Mini 4 Pro, especially if Costco runs a good bundle deal. Like right now, they sell a Mini 3 Pro bundle for $839 that includes the drone and RC-N1 controller, 2 extra batteries, charging hub, and a 128 GB SD card. All that would be $1,063 if bought from DJI directly.
DJI doesn't sell their latest drones directly in India so out of options here.
I saw the Mini Pro 4 has "Active Track 360", but I think that is just going to fly a 360 around whatever you choose and follow it as it goes.
I have the OG mini, and it certainly can't just "follow me" as I ride my mountain bike wherever. It's purely a software limitation to offer segmentation for their more expensive drones
I'm glad I caught that earlier, at one point the Mini 3 went on a good sale and I almost picked it up. Glad I didn't waste the money.
Wasn't this loophole basically closed by the US FAA a couple years back?
[0] https://www.caa.co.uk/drones/rules-and-categories-of-drone-f...
My biggest issue with my Spark is the 9 minute battery life. Even though I have 4 batteries, having to constantly land and swap the batteries is a real drag.
Does anybody have one of the older Minis? How do they compare to the Spark?
Which at some point becomes boring. Like you usually don't have enough interesting things to do with the drone to stay engaged that long.
So something like a 45 minute flight is not going to make me buy a newer one, cause i don't have something interesting/important I need to do for that long.
I'll probably sell it if you're interested
I'm hesitant to buy another DJI for the reasons above but I haven't seen any non DJI products that wow me. I guess it's a toss up between the FPV and the mini 4.
Main remaining use of the Pocket is having rotating timelapses. That's the only reason I still pack it, and even then only use it on 1/10 trips.
The Mini (2019) was a big step up compared to the Spark (2017) with merely a 2-axis gimbal and the Mini 2 (2020) brought very welcome range and camera improvements. I don't have first hand experience with anything more recent but it looks like both the range and the camera keep improving in those. The flight time, top speed and wind resistance are also increasing.
So i'm not sure what in particular you feel hasn't improved significantly.
Like motocross, or a basketball game, or a car meet.
There's no way I'm taking out a buzzy drone when out on a quiet hike or at a typical campground. Just kills the calmness.
There is no way you can keep visual contact at this distance, especially for a tiny drone like this, and you’re getting relatively close to air traffic in some places. Europe is quite dense. Makes sense that going further requires a license / flight plan.
everything else idk
might make drone LED shows easier though, those are probably a bigger use case than the one off drone enthusiast
