DaveHudsonATL
 lvl.1
Flight distance : 5735 ft
United States
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I wanted to make a post to hopefully help others out that see this "problem" which isn't really a DJI problem. I've seen some posts here and on other threads about "lag" with the M2. The short answer is that I don't believe is any issue with the Drones or the DJI App. The problem is with the phones overheating. iPhone in particular will "slow down the CPU to control temperature" - that is what's causing lag. For more details, see below.
Let me first walk you through my scenario and it will hopefully shed some light on this. I was at my parent's farm in North Florida and wanted to do some drone footage and pictures of the entire farm. I decided this was a great place to use the Mavic 2 Zoom.
Flight 1-3:
Time: 6:00am to 8:00am
Outside (ambient) Temperature: 65-75 degrees F
Flight Time: Approx 22 mins each
Max Range: Approx 1600 feet
Display/Control Device: iPhone X
Actions performed: 1080p flight/video recording
Problems encountered: None - flawless flights!
I got up nice and early (5:30am) as I wanted to get some footage of the sunrise and the fog that usually lingers in the morning. The temperature was cool (68 degrees F) I did 3 flights, all about 22 minutes each. Long story short, all 3 flights were flawless - perfect image transmission, excellent response, no lag, etc. Was an absolute blast!
Flight 4-6 (2 days later actually)
Time: Noon to 2:00pm
Outside (ambient) Temperature: 90-95 degrees F
Flight Time: Approx 22 mins each
Max Range: Approx 1800 feet
Display/Control Device: iPhone X
Actions performed: 1080p flight/video recording, some quick shots
Problems encountered: First flight - extreme lag, unresponsiveness of aircraft (perception, not reality). Second and third flight, flawless, no problems, no lag.
So on my second round of flights, i was on a time constraint, so my only chance was to get out from Noon to 2pm to do my "full daylight" footage. I started everything up and right off the bat, the video signal was lagging, the aircraft seemed unresponsive at a distance, the experience was terrible - i only flew out to a range of about 800 feet. I brought the aircraft back and landed. I was going to reset everything including closing all the apps on my phone. When I pulled the iPhone out of the controller, i swipped up to close apps and noticed the phone was lagging. I then closed the DJI 4 app and started using some other apps - same experience.... screen refresh was slow, it was slow switching between apps, etc. I then took the case off my phone and touched the back of it - it was extremely HOT! I realized i had found my problem. I set my phone in the shade (on some cool concrete actually) and waited for it to cool down for about 20 mins.
The phone seemed to be much cooler and responsive again, so i hooked back up and launched the aircraft again (same battery, still had about 90%). This time, however, i did 2 things differently:
1) I took the case off of my phone so it wouldn't trap heat
2) I stood in the shade to keep the hot sun off the phone
The flight was flawless with no lag, no issues, etc. I flew out to about 1800 feet away. I then flew the other two batteries and did additional footage as well as some quickshots. No issues at all. When the aircraft was far away from me, it "appeared to me to lag in responsiveness" because all i could see was a tiny dot... it was responding, it was just taking the iPhone a long time to catch up and show me what was going on.
So the finding is that your phone is likely the weakest link in your aircraft control chain. I will fly with my case off from now on and work to keep the phone as cool as I can.
Hope this helps others who may see this problem.
Dave
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