Well we (
@spiderpig & myself) braved the elements today and tested the new Epson
Moverio BT-300 (Drone Edition) Smart Glasses, it was 32 degrees with a windchill of 20ish outside.
1st impressions-well-made, high quality and a slick contemporary look. They come packed in a semi-hardshell zipper case and all the components fit easily/neatly inside. Unlike my Cinemizer's case where it takes me 5 minutes to get all the cables precisely packed in order to zipper the case.
The "Drone Edition" will ship w/Phantom/Inspire mount, dark lens shades (not sure about the brand of sunshades) and DJI GO 4.0 App installed (the DJI GO app may be updated by release date). A Mavic mount is available via
Moverio Accessories by moverio7 - Shapeways Shops
The Moverios run on an Android OS and navigation around the OS is performed via a built-in track-pad on the controller. The biggest issue I had was using the track-pad, I use an external mouse on my laptops because of my lack of finger control, but that's no reflection on the responsiveness of the track-pad.
@spiderpig had no issues using it.
The glasses felt light & comfortable on my face. I am nearsighted and did NOT wear my glasses, though there is an included extended nose bridge which allows the user to wear the
Moverio over their glasses. Depending on the users' facial features (i.e. wide, narrow, big nose, etc.) the glasses will be worn differently for each. Meaning further up or down on the bridge of the users nose. Back to me "not wearing my glasses...when looking through the Moverios at the image on the glasses it was like viewing a 40+" television.
The sun was directly over our heads and not a cloud in the sky, thus I opted to mount the included Rochester Optical sunshade to the glasses which takes about 5 seconds to install. A little longer on cold days due to me shivering!
Connected the
Moverio controller to the Mavic RC via the USB port and fired both of them up, then turned on the Mavic. Upon takeoff the first thing I noticed was that the sun was NOT a factor at all and purposely flew directly into it. The
Moverio image was as crisp as if I were back in my office.
3 minutes into the flight I said "WTF" the latency was at least 20 second if not worse. I did not experience any latency when I bench tested them a day earlier in my office and thought that the cold could have been the issue.
I brought the Mavic in and exited the DJI GO app in order to look at what was running in the background of the Android OS. Sure enough I notice that there were 2 versions of the DJI GO app running. Between my ineptness for the track-pad and shivering, I must have clicked/tapped it twice.
Took off again and there was NO measurable latency whatsoever.
I have a pair of Fatshark Dominator V3 and Cinemizers. Flying with the
BT-300 glasses is an entirely different experience. I never enjoyed flying with the totally enclosed style
goggles and always found myself lifting them from my face in order to view the attached tablet/phone. Flying with the Moverios is like flying with a semi-transparent tablet right in front of your face.
In conclusion, if you're looking for an option to fly FPV, along with still having VLOS then the Moverios are the ticket. We created a video and
@spiderpig will be editing it along with posting it soon. It should also be noted that
@spiderpig flew with the Moverios too and he'll surely add his opinion.
Oh and we flew an entire battery for the test.
