GoPro Having Too Many Problems With Drone

[HWCM]

Of you want a Karma now, watch for the sales. If it goes like 3DR, you can probably get one new for a couple hundred dollars.
The 3DR quads were originally $900, but you can but them new in the box now for around $250.
I bought a bunch of quad parts from 3DR when they stopped selling to the public. I got a bunch of motors, I still have them, for $6 each. Original $35

 

[borislip]

Probably wont happen, a quad + gopro is never going below the actual gopro, as long as they still sell the later.

 

[Johnmcl7]

Did anyone on this thread actually fly the karma? Just wondering if its all second hand speculations.

No, I didn't fly one myself but spent a lot of time researching it as I initially I'd planned to buy the Mavic so I wouldn't say any of it is 'speculation'. I tried to dismiss a lot of the early negative feedback on the Karma but even after the initial recall the user reviews and forum posts from owners were consistent in showing the Karma still had a lot of issues.

Even if the Karma had released perfectly, I think it would have needed to have been launched around a year ahead of Mavic to stand a chance but starting with a product recall for a major flaw, then re-releasing against the now in stock Mavic with a still flawed design and then DJI releasing the better specced Spark were just nail after nail into the Karma coffin.

I can understand why GoPro stepped into drones as clearly they've been struggling action camera market and now with the Karma sunk, they're in trouble. Some of it understandable though as some of their pricing is just insane at the moment, a GoPro6 and a Karma stabiliser is £700 while the Xiaomi Yi 4k+ was on special offer last week for just £240. Worse still is that rather than a cheap knock off, the Xiaomi was released months ahead of the GoPro6 and first to offer 4k+, their gimbal design is much better as well.

I was a big fan of the little GoPro Session cameras which I feel were underrated, I've a couple of them now and like them for their very small size, convenient to use and not that expensive either.

 

[JoKhool]

Did anyone on this thread actually fly the karma? Just wondering if its all second hand speculations.

I have personally never flown a Karma. I have seen one in action, just so happened that it ended in a catastrophic failure. Even though I was dead set on the Mavic, this was just further confirmation on my decision. I need to get back out flying again, been an extremely busy few months.

 

[kiwi flyer]

Then when the first Karmas were released, they had the fault they were falling from the sky which killed off any idea of getting a Karma for me as I'd bought a GoPro3 Black Edition on the back of glowing reviews and found it to be a highly unreliable beta device that wasn't ready for release.

If you remember the GoPro Hero 3? it had major hardware issues that GPro would not acknowledge, they kept releasing patches, then released the Hero 3+ as the "new" model..

I haven't touched a newer version of their products since.. The Karma did catch my eye when it was announced and hyped but the Mavic blew it away when it was launched!
It reminded me of when Steve Jobs released the original iPod Shuffle at a Motorola Phone launch!

 

[Johnmcl7]

If you remember the GoPro Hero 3? it had major hardware issues that GPro would not acknowledge, they kept releasing patches, then released the Hero 3+ as the "new" model..

I haven't touched a newer version of their products since.. The Karma did catch my eye when it was announced and hyped but the Mavic blew it away when it was launched!
It reminded me of when Steve Jobs released the original iPod Shuffle at a Motorola Phone launch!

Yeah, that's the GoPro I was referring to - it was my first GoPro and assumed I had a faulty device until I read other user reviews who all had exactly the same problems as me. I eventually bought a Garmin Virb which was vastly better than the GoPro3 as it was reliable, its batterylife was much longer even with features like GPS enabled and its interface was much easier to use. Still I was surprised to see professional review shootouts listing the Garmin last and the GoPro3BE a clear winner, worse yet was listing batterylife as a flaw on the Garmin but not the GoPro3 even though the GoPro could barely manage an hour and the Garmin could do over two and a half hours.

Clearly the GoPro name was strong enough that they got away with it and they seem to have taken a similar approach with the Karma but this time they don't have the dominant market position get away with it.