Mavic Air 1 Controller won't charge & has cable connection problems

Muravey · Sep 3, 2024

Hello!

I'm completely new to the world of drones. My first contact with anything drone-related was the used Mavic Air 1that I was gifted a couple of weeks ago.

My phone is a Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 Pro with Android 12 and USB-C connectivity. After managing to sideload the DJI GO 4 app from an apk website, the first thing I noticed is that the short DJI

(RC) ->

(USB-C) cable didn't work. It took me a while to figure that out. The previous owner had no idea about it, as he's got an iPhone and only used the

(RC) ->

(Lightning) cable in the set. After he opened my eyes and explained that the weird RC port takes a regular Micro-USB plug, I was able to put together a

(Micro-USB) ->

(Micro-USB + USB-C adapter) Frankencable to connect to my phone. It wasn't pretty, but it worked. I did my first few flights. Bliss. Ecstasy. A brave new world of sky-borne photography and filmography had opened the eyes of the blind.

Next, I realised that a

(USB-A) ->

(USB-C) cable could be used to connect the controller to the phone via the so-called "Assisstant Video Link Port" on the

, which I also did. Why? Well, I was glad to do away with the extra adapter on my previous Frankencable, as

(USB-A) ->

(USB-C) cables are much more abundant in my bottomless drawer of electronic stuff.

Did a few more flights. Filmed my girlfriend walking along the shore. Filmed her again on some tetrapods by the breakwater. Happiness was an angry bee with 4 propellers in the sky, flown by a bald guy with a little black box in his hands. In the meantime, I ordered a couple of proper

(RC Port) ->

(USB-C) cables and I'm eagerly awaiting their delivery.

So now it's been a couple of days since last I've flown this drone. As I wait for the proper cables to arrive, I try to connect the

->

to review some settings in the GO 4. Nothing happens. For some reason, most

(USB-A) ->

(USB-C) cables no longer stay connected. The phone will connect, then disconnect two seconds later, then repeat the process ad infinitum. Odd, right? Then I try the ole' trusty Frankencable. Still no connection between

and

at all. Really odd, right? Then I restart the

, restart the

a bunch of times, to no avail. USB debugging under the phone's developer options is on. The

still connects fine to the

, by the way.

Pictures of some of the cables below. From left to right: DJI USB-C cable that didn't work. Frankencable. Assortment of other cables that worked until now, but have suddenly changed their minds (so to speak).

By this point, I'm surrounded by cables on my desk, none of which will work. I start to panic. For some reason, it turns out that a

(USB-A) ->

(magnetic end + USB-C magnetic plug) that I had tested the night before manages to connect the devices just fine. My panicked, gas-lit self starts to wonder if I screwed up the

's brains with this cable the night before.

The

still shows 3 LEDs of charge out of 4. It still connects to the

. I can still connect it to the

with that magnetic cable via the assisstant link port. But it will not charge at all. Not via the DJI wall charger, not via any of my wall chargers, nothing.

A symptom that has led me to believe there's something weird happening inside the

now is how my PC and two monitors react to my attempt at plugging the

into the

(Win10): both monitors short out for a second, and the "USB disconnected" chime sounds twice. When I unplug it, the "USB connected" chime comes on. And Windows Explorer gets screwed up, menus not wanting to work until I restart their process via Task Manager. Almost as if the

's USB connection shorts my gadgets out.

Check this video out:

So. Plastic description with poor humour aside, what can I do? Has anyone ever experienced this before? Have I busted my controller somehow?

Thanks in advance!

Muravey · Sep 6, 2024

So I went ahead and figured it out for myself. And - quite traditionally indeed - it turned out to be a mix of problems.

My spidey sense was tingling enough that I went back to my aforementioned drawer of monkey bits and yoinked out an ever heftier bundle of cables. I thus discovered that the Micro USB charging/data port on the Mavic Air controller was a bit tired, and only a couple of cables had the proper fit to find the sweet spot and charge the controller. Blame it on minúte manufacturing differences, chalk it up to different rates of wear and tear on the cables - probably a combination of both. On top of that, I get the feeling that some of the USB-C cables I have aren't properly rated for data transmission, hence the connection to the phone getting stuck in a loop of doom. Or maybe DJI's controller is just terribly fussy.

As luck would have it, the local classifieds had me find a guy who was offering a really good deal on two such controllers. Add to that his willingness to haggle for a bit and the offer to pay for half from the guy who sold me the drone and I scored two replacements for future peace of mind. Upon further testing, even the original RC -> USB-C cable turned out to work just fine - another confirmation for the tired Micro USB port. At some point I'll probably get around to opening the problematic RC and attempting a Micro USB port replacement. We'll see just how shaky hands can be with the soldering iron.

Happiness is a cake best served with a cherry on top, and my cherry (hue hue) ended up being another archeological dig-up in the drawer'o'treasures of an ancient Huawei Android phone (P8 Lite 2018, Android 8.0). Funny how a phone from the same era as this Mavic "deserves" to be called ancient. I had a hunch that an older phone would be less fussy about the FCC hack, and I kinda' wasn't willing to reinstall the stuff on my main phone. I charged this old relic for a bit, booted it up, side-loaded version 4.3.37 of DJI GO 4 (get it here), got Fake GPS from the Play Store, pretended an UFO had picked me up in Eastern Europe and thrown me halfway across the Nevada desert, started the controller, started the drone, booted the GO 4 and voilá! App asked me to change connection settings, and now the drone is in FCC mode.

Can't wait to take it out for a renewed (and hopefully much improved) test!

And does anyone use this radio dish to boost their signal?

P.S.: If a moderator believes this topic could benefit from a [SOLVED] tag to aid future lost souls, I kindly ask them to modify the topic title accordingly.

Felix le Chat · Sep 6, 2024

The parabolic reflector dishes work in principle: but if you take a look at the 2.4ghz tuned Yagi/Uda slip-on 'antennas', they are proven to improve the transmission signal. They don't 'boost' anything, they're passive, but what they do is shape the signal and focus it which gives the signal a bit more reach.