DJI Phantom 2 Vision+ "V1.0" Quadcopter with FPV HD Video Camera and 3-Axis Gimbal Bundle with Extra Battery

I have been waiting for the last few months to finally order one of these. I have a DJI Phantom FC40 that I really like, but was wanting flight telemetry, better video and photo capabilities, increased battery life and of course, increasing FPV range. So, here it finally is, the Phantom 2 Vision +. The Vision + is just about everything I expected. The FC40 required a bit more assembly than the Vision +. The only thing you have to do with Vision + is put on the propellers. You have to download a couple of desktop applications, connect the controller and Phantom and update the firmware, calibrate the compass, and you are ready to fly. There is an app for your phone and tablet to control the camera and settings that seems to work pretty well. I was a little anxious putting this thing up in the air with all the stories about them having problems and flying off. I started up the wifi extender, turned on the controller, and slide the battery in and powered up the Phantom. It took a while for the wifi connection to be made the first time, but once I was, I opened up the app, turned on the camera, and got ready to fly. After the display indicated that 7 satellites were locked, I fired up the drone and lifted off. It flies beautifully, is very stable, and extremely fun. The gimble takes out all the movement and jarring that the FC40 camera had issues with. The app interface is pretty straightforward, and control of the camera's vertical axis is very cool. Taking pictures and video is as easy as touching a button on the screen. This setup yields very smooth video, with decent resolution. The photos are very nice, and can be saved as RAW images. With Adobe Lightroom, (there is a DJI Phantom profile for it) you can take out the fisheye effect. The battery life is excellent, and the screen keeps track of the battery, and tells you how long before you have to head back to land before the Phantom lands itself. I've flown about 1500ft away so far, and once I get a few things ironed out, I'll be pushing the envelop. I haven't used the Groundstation yet, but once the issues below are taken care of, I will be trying it out. There are a few things though.......The wifi extender must be pretty directional, because if you aren't pointed directly at the Phantom, you loose the video feed and flight telemetry. There is a flight radar that can help you keep track of the direction the Phantom is in, but I loose the video feed several times in the course of a flight. I know you have to sacrifice something for distance, but perhaps with more practice I can remedy this issue. While the battery life is excellent, my "smart" batteries and charger don't seem to be getting along. I've charged each battery about half a dozen times, and now, neither one will charge. At all. I've tried a couple of things to trick the charger into working, but now that doesn't even work. I now have a $1200 drone that can't get off the ground. I ordered a new charger while waiting to hear back about replacing it through warranty, but I use these things almost every day, and losing days is not what I want at this point. Bottom line, this is a wonderful product. DJI has come a long way in making these safe, reliable, and user-friendly. Aside from the connection issues, and the battery/charging issue, I absolutely love this thing. Anyone that has a Phantom 1 variant, and has the money, upgrading is worth it.

Simply put, I wouldn't recommend the DJI Phantom 2 Vision+.The Good:The Phantom 2 is easy to learn how to fly and, once learned, is FUN to fly and will bring out the kid in anyone. The videos and pictures I took were beautiful, clear, and smooth. In short, when the Phantom works like it's suppose to, it's well worth the money - at least in theory, and this is where the good ends.The Bad:From day 1 my Phantom had problems locking on to GPS signals. About 60% of the time I used the Phantom it would eventually lock on to 9 GPS signals, but commonly would begin dropping GPS signals down to 6, 4, and sometimes 3, causing the Phantom to no longer fly in a straight line, but fly diagonally, and couldn't find it's way back home properly, or even hover. This would happen in a clear, windless cloudless day, in the middle of a massive open field with no power lines, cell phone towers, or even satellite dishes in sight - setting the compass on the Phantom didn't seem to help any.Hovering, which is one of the things DJI prides themselves the Phantom can do effortlessly, never worked for me. My Phantom would swirl in big 15 feet circles, or or would sway to the side and back in a nearly straight line. I never did find out if it would correct itself, because by 20 to 30 away from what is suppose to be a hover I would try to bring it back to me.Randomly drops altitude. At times when I could get hovering to somewhat work, about 2/3 of the time the phantom would randomly drop about 10 to 15 feet in altitude and then slowly work it's way back up to it's original height. This may not be a big deal when you are flying 500ft up, but when your flying at 5 to 10 feet because you are taking videos of your family it becomes a huge issue.Drops from the sky. This one puzzles me. I've watched my Phantom drop from the sky from above 200 feet in the middle of a girls soccer game. Luckily no one was hurt. No wind, nothing. All my props were still on. It wiggled to the back and then one side and went straight down. WTF?? Surprisingly, the only thing that broke was one of my props. What finally did my Phantom in was one of these drops when I was trying to yaw the Phantom while hovering at about 10 feet. As it was yawing I could hear two of the motors spin up really high causing the Phantom to pitch back and drop altitude fast making somewhat of a hard landing on the pavement with it's landing gear, but bouncing the phantom back up as it started going back to it's original height - but the damage was done.Don't buy the Vision+The one small landing issue broke the DJI gimbal for the camera. Physically the gimbal looked fine, but it no longer functioned, swirling the camera around and jerking it down - That was it, couldn't do anything to fix it.DJI Support.I could write an entire book on the bad experience I had with their phone support - but when I finally got someone on the line and was able to set up an RMA, there 30 day turn around service took 75+ days.My thoughts...I bought the Phantom 2 Vision+ mainly because at the time it was the only Phantom model that operated on the higher 5.8 Ghz spectrum range and is suppose to be less likely to have Phantom Flyaways. That was the most important thing to me, I didn't want to lose a phantom from a fly-away like others had reported with the original Phantom and the Phantom 2. To DJI's credit, I never experienced a Flyaway with the Vision+, but everything else left a bad taste. After spending quite amount of time researching on-line and in forums, it appears a small percentage of Phantom owners experience these similar problems and unfortunately there isn't a fix. Latest firmware, Compass calibration, and even using the DJI Nazam Assistant software to reset everything didn't fix the problem. I've since received my Phantom 2 Vision+ back from DJI suport, and it flys wonderfully and hovers like it should, but, I've lost confidence in my Phantom from all of the past problems I had and find myself not using it like other people do on youtube, out of fear that it'll start with the problems like before and I will lose or destroy the Phantom from a crash.In conclusion....I would not recommend the Phantom 2 Vision+.The Gimbal and camera seem very sensitive, and can break from simple knocks and bumps.Buying a new DJI Gimbal and camera cost more then half the price of the Phantom 2 Vision+I would suggest buying the DJI Phantom 2 Quadcopter with Zenmuse H3-3D 3-Axis Gimbal and a GoPro camera. At least if these parts break, you can pick them up from other retailers for much cheaper. I would still suggest this at the expense of the higher 5.8 frequency range then what the normal Phantom 2 can use.And Lastly, DJI support is horrible - one of the worst experience of support in my life.. Even though they eventually fixed my Phantom, their support is not what I would call "public" ready. In-fact even with a perfect working DJI Phantom 2 Vision+, it still has some serious quirks. I'd personally wait for their 3rd or 4th gen models to come out as DJI seems to be building better drones each year, like with the Inspire model.