$1109 for new fly more combo at DJI
Or $1109 at B&H
Crutchfield is already sold out of the FMC.
Or $1109 at B&H
Crutchfield is already sold out of the FMC.
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Air 2S went on sale today
- Thread starter Mavikhan
- Start date
Thank you for the heads up.
The DJI refurb FMC is unchanged at $889. That means that today a new Air 2S FMC at DJI only costs $220 more than a refurb FMC. I am very, very tempted.
maggior
Well-Known Member
maggior
Well-Known Member
I tend to lag by model. I got my Mavic Air 2 when the Air 2S came out. I didn't get my A2S until this past fall as an upgrade and still be able to use all of my existing stuff like batteries, controllers, case, etc.
I am right here with you. I have been going back and forth for months on going over my Mini 3 Pro sub-250g weight because someone else here pointed out that the heavier batteries in the Mini 3 fly more kit blew that up already anyway.
I love my Mini 3 Pro but the Air 2S pricing is really tempting me as a stop-gap and learning tool on flying a larger registered drone (non-commercial still) that appears to have better image quality in almost everything I've seen than the Mini 3 Pro.
I can afford a Mavic 3 but I'm terrified of it for some reason. The second I buy it I am afraid the Mavic 4 with some camera advancement will arrive and then my Mavic 3 will collect dust because I keep frigging getting caught in DJI upgrade cycle want, but even then the Mavic 3 just seems like a step too far, whereas the Air 2S seems like a great upgrade at the moment.
Maybe it was weight and size that caused me to look past the Air 2S before I bought my M3P but it is back on the radar now.
For what it’s worth, I really like my Air2S. I’ve had absolutely no problems and I got mine as a refurbished FMC. I’ve had it for a year now. Best wishes on your decision.
I understand what you mean. However, I still have my two original mavic 1's with no updates since about a month after getting them. They do what I need, fly and video.
I'm more concerned about the flying limitations (ie rules) than new options I'm missing.
I ended up buying the Air 2S Fly more (new in box not refurb) from Best Buy and added the 1 year care. I currently fly a Mini 3 Pro every day unless weather won't let me, as my reference for DJI stuff.
TL;DR - bought new Air2S, out of the box one dead battery and poor image performance and errors. Firmware update and things improved but battery life may be a concern and full testing tomorrow for more photos, especially watching noise. Bonus Point: this drone rental will cost me 15% restocking fee if I return it for some reason lol
Out of the box, I marveled at the size and heft compared to my Mini 3 Pro and then went and got my sturdy little Mini 2 and realized it is well, a mini version of it lol. The Mini 3 Pro feels a little flimsy compared to these two.
Everything else was there, but once on the charger, one of the three batteries is stone dead. Does nothing on the charger, no light, but maybe someone here will say it is known and how to reset something. Not sure what I do on that, maybe I will call Best Buy.
So, I charged the remaining two batteries to full, updated the DJI app on my phone because I've landed myself back into that phone and controller life until I can get my RC to work with this, and took all the little tape pieces off the gimbal sides and back, and around the legs, inserted and secured the props (neat system). Stuffed the SD card in it, upside down and under a nice little cover.
Once everything was charged, updated, and signed in with care purchased, I decided to fly in my back yard property to see how it flew, etc. I have to register this one before I move I believe, but I wanted to see if she was true. *Side note on noise - wife commented on it immediately on take off from "the chair", as she is wont to do regardless if I'm in imminent danger of enjoying something even slightly, so I did agree that the side to side motion especially was much louder than my other drones but for a beefy motor setup and tight control like this, you're going to have to deal with a little but of that.
Immediately the screen complains of gimbal motor (is there a log for these?) and that goes away (orange dot) 30 feet up in Normal. I decide to just hover at 50 ft and now we've got motor warnings appearing. Something with an orange dot again about a motor so I'm starting to think this thing is going to fall out of the air so I land it. Recycle drone and remote, back up and same thing. Motor warnings intermittent but I decide to snap some pics and take quick video, and land it.
The pics were in lower light mainly, of sunset and clouds which I take all the time. Whoa boy, not good in Lightroom. Merging looked terrible and any noise reduction caused immediate blur...very weird. Fair to the drone, I left it on auto and didn't spend time manually messing around and:
Then I remember firmware and DJI Assistant 2 so get on that and I either refreshed or updated both the cheaper controller and the Air2S firmware to 02.04.2500 and my observations after flying a full battery in my garage with those stupid bright LED lights in there are as follows:
- Will battery life be a problem for me? The fully charged battery shows 26 minutes in my garage with no wind or elements you would expect to be absent inside. When I was flying the test flight outside pre-firmware update, I was trying not to pay attention to what looked like a pretty low battery already after 15 minutes. Now that it is updated, I no longer have gimbal or motor warnings, but we will see when I get a chance tomorrow to get a flight in again in the elements. I did read about expected battery but I thought it was 34+ or something. I usually fly 10 mins before sunset, through sunset for 29 minutes of shooting In that time, I will be doing untold flying, sometimes on the lake shore in decent gusts and this battery life tells me that I am not going to be able to to this without switching and I do not like the extra attention of a louder drone coming down one or two extra times. Plus distance is now a factor more than before.
- image quality - after the updates, I flew around my garage near and far, high and low from the LEDs and tried to get a lot of shadow and changes of light and it looks pretty good to me now. I took a few brackets of the vehicles in there and it looks better to me now but tomorrow outside will be the real test.
Now, there is yet another wrinkle to this that might be genius on DJI's part in some way. I am not sure what the psychology is here or how it works, but something about that Mavic 3 battery life now suddenly makes sense as the ACTUAL reason to buy it now lol
TL;DR - bought new Air2S, out of the box one dead battery and poor image performance and errors. Firmware update and things improved but battery life may be a concern and full testing tomorrow for more photos, especially watching noise. Bonus Point: this drone rental will cost me 15% restocking fee if I return it for some reason lol
Out of the box, I marveled at the size and heft compared to my Mini 3 Pro and then went and got my sturdy little Mini 2 and realized it is well, a mini version of it lol. The Mini 3 Pro feels a little flimsy compared to these two.
Everything else was there, but once on the charger, one of the three batteries is stone dead. Does nothing on the charger, no light, but maybe someone here will say it is known and how to reset something. Not sure what I do on that, maybe I will call Best Buy.
So, I charged the remaining two batteries to full, updated the DJI app on my phone because I've landed myself back into that phone and controller life until I can get my RC to work with this, and took all the little tape pieces off the gimbal sides and back, and around the legs, inserted and secured the props (neat system). Stuffed the SD card in it, upside down and under a nice little cover.
Once everything was charged, updated, and signed in with care purchased, I decided to fly in my back yard property to see how it flew, etc. I have to register this one before I move I believe, but I wanted to see if she was true. *Side note on noise - wife commented on it immediately on take off from "the chair", as she is wont to do regardless if I'm in imminent danger of enjoying something even slightly, so I did agree that the side to side motion especially was much louder than my other drones but for a beefy motor setup and tight control like this, you're going to have to deal with a little but of that.
Immediately the screen complains of gimbal motor (is there a log for these?) and that goes away (orange dot) 30 feet up in Normal. I decide to just hover at 50 ft and now we've got motor warnings appearing. Something with an orange dot again about a motor so I'm starting to think this thing is going to fall out of the air so I land it. Recycle drone and remote, back up and same thing. Motor warnings intermittent but I decide to snap some pics and take quick video, and land it.
The pics were in lower light mainly, of sunset and clouds which I take all the time. Whoa boy, not good in Lightroom. Merging looked terrible and any noise reduction caused immediate blur...very weird. Fair to the drone, I left it on auto and didn't spend time manually messing around and:
Then I remember firmware and DJI Assistant 2 so get on that and I either refreshed or updated both the cheaper controller and the Air2S firmware to 02.04.2500 and my observations after flying a full battery in my garage with those stupid bright LED lights in there are as follows:
- Will battery life be a problem for me? The fully charged battery shows 26 minutes in my garage with no wind or elements you would expect to be absent inside. When I was flying the test flight outside pre-firmware update, I was trying not to pay attention to what looked like a pretty low battery already after 15 minutes. Now that it is updated, I no longer have gimbal or motor warnings, but we will see when I get a chance tomorrow to get a flight in again in the elements. I did read about expected battery but I thought it was 34+ or something. I usually fly 10 mins before sunset, through sunset for 29 minutes of shooting In that time, I will be doing untold flying, sometimes on the lake shore in decent gusts and this battery life tells me that I am not going to be able to to this without switching and I do not like the extra attention of a louder drone coming down one or two extra times. Plus distance is now a factor more than before.
- image quality - after the updates, I flew around my garage near and far, high and low from the LEDs and tried to get a lot of shadow and changes of light and it looks pretty good to me now. I took a few brackets of the vehicles in there and it looks better to me now but tomorrow outside will be the real test.
Now, there is yet another wrinkle to this that might be genius on DJI's part in some way. I am not sure what the psychology is here or how it works, but something about that Mavic 3 battery life now suddenly makes sense as the ACTUAL reason to buy it now lol
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Okay there is a lot to unpack here. I have read this post several times. Is this a Best Buy refurb?
BetterBizWorks
Well-Known Member
I picked on up. It will be a nice upgrade to the air 2. I can still fly litchi with this until we figure out if DJI is going let 3rd parties use the software. Thanks for the tip. Great Deal.
maggior
Well-Known Member
I was able to capture the motor error, so I am going to try to return it all today.
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