The weak link

[AMGKid]

I love the style and flight time of the Mavic Mini. Price seems comparable to similar HD FPV rigs. The weak link for me is the wifi radio. With nearly 30 minutes of flight time where am I gonna go on Wifi? From my Spark and what I’ve seen of the Mavic Air, the Wifi ain’t gonna cut it. Mavic Pro Mini is gonna be a beast.

 

[Deleted member 3792]

I love the style and flight time of the Mavic Mini. Price seems comparable to similar HD FPV rigs. The weak link for me is the wifi radio. With nearly 30 minutes of flight time where am I gonna go on Wifi? From my Spark and what I’ve seen of the Mavic Air, the Wifi ain’t gonna cut it. Mavic Pro Mini is gonna be a beast.

In line of sight perhaps, isn’t that good enough?

 

[CanadaDrone]

In most countries it's illegal to fly out of VLOS without a dedicated spotter, which is inconvenient to organize anyway. 4KM is the same range as the Mavic Air and it is for the most part a non-issue. You can still have plenty of fun.

Also, now that it will be legal (in most places) to fly in parks, back yards, etc. in my opinion it will be easy to kill that 30min battery (which will really be around 22-25min because you will want to RTH around 20-30% remaining). This will be fun to zip around in even if you aren't recording photos/video.

 

[Lastrexking]

I love the style and flight time of the Mavic Mini. Price seems comparable to similar HD FPV rigs. The weak link for me is the wifi radio. With nearly 30 minutes of flight time where am I gonna go on Wifi? From my Spark and what I’ve seen of the Mavic Air, the Wifi ain’t gonna cut it. Mavic Pro Mini is gonna be a beast.

You're not going to get anything the size of the mini with anything other than WiFi for at least five years. The occusynch unit required it too big, needs lots of power (so bigger heavier battery), and lots of cooling. Only the Pro is big enough to handle it.

 

[AMGKid]

My Spark can’t make it to where LOS can and neither can Mavic Air. Wifi interference in your parks, backyards, etc. will limit your range well below half of that 4K estimate. At least that’s what my testing showed me having flown all of these DJI birds (sans MM) with multiple antennas and in multiple environment types.

 

[CanadaDrone]

My Spark can’t make it to where LOS can and neither can Mavic Air. Wifi interference in your parks, backyards, etc. will limit your range well below half of that 4K estimate. At least that’s what my testing showed me having flown all of these DJI birds (sans MM) with multiple antennas and in multiple environment types.

I had a Mavic Air and it can very easily make it past VLOS unless you an see out 3-4KM, which I personally can't. I have had it out over 3KM with a spotter in an urban area without issue. I have flown it in a half dozen countries as well and have never had range/interference issues. I don't see why the Mini would be any different. That might vary depending on the environment, but it's certainly possible/capable. If there is interference strong enough to reduce the range of the Air, it would also reduce the range of an Occusync product, you just have a bigger buffer zone with Occusync (I.e. even if range was reduced 50%, you still have 4KM of good range, but Occusync is by no means immune to that same interference).

 

[Lastrexking]

My Spark can’t make it to where LOS can and neither can Mavic Air. Wifi interference in your parks, backyards, etc. will limit your range well below half of that 4K estimate. At least that’s what my testing showed me having flown all of these DJI birds (sans MM) with multiple antennas and in multiple environment types.

You must have a dud Air. Mine can go to the point I can only see the flashing lights, and would no doubt go much further if I was happy to take it out of vlos, and I’m I Europe where the range is reduced .

 

[old man mavic]

i do not think that range is going to be a problem,for those like myself who already own a MPP i struggle to see it after around 1200 ft from the home point and it has a bright orange day glow skin and bright LEDs on the front arms to aid with direction, compared to the mini which is much smaller i doubt if i am going to be able to see it at anywhere that sort of range, and i think that it will be because of its size, something to use in areas such as flying in confined places where slow precise flying is the norm, and if fitted with the comprehensive prop cages and light weight it should fair well if it makes contact with something,also when the prop guards are fitted it restricts the flight envelope so it is easier to fly if range is your thing then stick to the larger mavics with occusync

 

[AMGKid]

I do find it odd that they include prop guards. Marketing as a beginner toy? As I said the wifi is the issue and not for control, but for video. DJI wifi video transmission already has poor latency and range compared to Occusync and analog FPV options. Add home/business wifi interference and your image is trash at range for those confined spaces with slow precise flying. Maybe the sensors save you. If you’ve been using these DJI products and following their tech progression, it’s just MM seems a transitional product away from larger consumer drones and not the defining products that MP and M2 have been imho.

 

[DanMan32]

It wasn't supposed to be anywhere near the MP/M2 class. It's closer to the replacement of the spark.

 

[MavicVA]

It wasn't supposed to be anywhere near the MP/M2 class. It's closer to the replacement of the spark.

That’s exactly what it is. A new Spark

 

[mjbok]

Two drawbacks.

No follow me.
2.7k.

 

[AMGKid]

The product is described as Mavic Mini. Not Spark Pro or Spark 2. Not second generation Spark that I could find on DJI’s website. Where did you see it listed as a new Spark?

That’s exactly what it is. A new Spark

 

[MavicVA]

The product is described as Mavic Mini. Not Spark Pro or Spark 2. Not second generation Spark that I could find on DJI’s website. Where did you see it listed as a new Spark?

Because that’s what it is. It doesn’t matter what it’s called. A Yukon and a Tahoe are the same thing no matter what they are called.

 

[John Locke]

Two drawbacks.

No follow me.
2.7k.

I could cope with 2.7K. I could also cope with Wifi too, but the slow write speed of 40mbps is a show stopper for me. It should have been 100mbps like the Air.

If DJI could make this with OcuSync2, and 4K with 100mbps writes, I'd pay $600. I think it's a heat problem, that's why it's 40mbps, to mitigate the need for heavy heatsinks, I'm thinking.

It's so darn cute, it's even blonde (color of a cloudy day sky), but looks are only skin deep.

 

[WithTheBirds]

You're not going to get anything the size of the mini with anything other than WiFi for at least five years. The occusynch unit required it too big, needs lots of power (so bigger heavier battery), and lots of cooling. Only the Pro is big enough to handle it.

Assumption?

With wifi you still need the mpeg encoder front end. The FPGA, radio and RF TX amp chips won’t present a significant weight or power demand issue (over wifi).

How much heavier was a P3 Advanced or Pro over the standard and what was the reduction in flight time? Ocusync is improved lightbridge which is glorified wifi.

The reason ocusync isn’t included is almost certainly model differentiation, price point and marketing. If you have something to back your claims please share.

 

[John Locke]

The reason ocusync isn’t included is almost certainly model differentiation, price point and marketing. If you have something to back your claims please share.

It's a weight issue too. OcuSync, and mainly the high 100mbps video write speeds takes more weight to cool the chips. And anything with OcuSync will have ADB-S support, weighing more, which I consider a junk feature I don't want and will never use, and I'll pay the weight and flight time penalty too. I'm hoping for a 350G weight MMPro with only the stuff I want, which is OcuSync2 and 100mbps write speed.

 

[WithTheBirds]

It's a weight issue too. OcuSync, and mainly the high 100mbps video write speeds takes more weight to cool the chips. And anything with OcuSync will have ADB-S support, weighing more, which I consider a junk feature I don't want and will never use, and I'll pay the weight and flight time penalty too. I'm hoping for a 350G weight MMPro with only the stuff I want, which is OcuSync2 and 100mbps write speed.

Why do you expect you need 100mbps write speed for ocusync? There is no significant weight heat or power issue (it very well could be a factor for 100mbps video encoding yes but I can’t see how that is relavent to my post). Have a look in an ocusync AC. Weight and heat arent the issue.

 

[Lastrexking]

Assumption?

With wifi you still need the mpeg encoder front end. The FPGA, radio and RF TX amp chips won’t present a significant weight or power demand issue (over wifi).

How much heavier was a P3 Advanced or Pro over the standard and what was the reduction in flight time? Ocusync is improved lightbridge which is glorified wifi.

The reason ocusync isn’t included is almost certainly model differentiation, price point and marketing. If you have something to back your claims please share.

No. Engineering knowledge, and facts. Use google and look up the occusynch unit. It’s fairly large. Also, look at its power consumption and the heat it generates. Once you’ve done that you’ll see it’s very obvious that’s it’s not possible to put it in a drone where the objective is to keep the weight down. You need a bigger chassis, bigger battery, and a bigger cooling system. All of this is why they didn’t put Occusynch in the Mavic Air, which is much bigger than the mini.

As for proof, all I have is an undocumented and unrecorded conversation with a DJI engineer at the UK Mavic Air media event I attended.

 

[WithTheBirds]

No. Engineering knowledge, and facts. Use google and look up the occusynch unit. It’s fairly large. Also, look at its power consumption and the heat it generates. Once you’ve done that you’ll see it’s very obvious that’s it’s not possible to put it in a drone where the objective is to keep the weight down. You need a bigger chassis, bigger battery, and a bigger cooling system. All of this is why they didn’t put Occusynch in the Mavic Air, which is much bigger than the mini.

As for proof, all I have is an undocumented and unrecorded conversation with a DJI engineer at the UK Mavic Air media event I attended.

You think you would need a seperate ocusync unit? Why? That would be a great example of bad engineering. Have a look at any of the ocusync equipped phantoms or mavics and you will understand. While your at it look at the specifications, compare the max tx power for the mini and an ocusync bird. Additional power consumption and heat would be of no significance. The answer is you don’t put your best tech and features in your cheapest products. That would be silly for obvious reasons.