There is a growing list of "GOTCHAS" around the new DJI FPV Drone you need to be aware of.

1.  It is GEO-FENCED.  You will find out if it arms (OR NOT) at your favorite flying spots after you buy it.     
2.  It is altitude limited.  If you mountain surf, you will not be able to go further up the mountain than 500 meters before it stops you.  Even if flying at ground level.
3.  The new game controller style controller does NOT work with Air Units or Vistas.
4.  If you crash/break it, it is $439 total to get it fixed under the DJI Care program.  (and you wont even be eligible for that unless you sign up for the program within 48 hours of registering).  
5.  No spare arms or motors will be sold.  
6.  The HDMI Out function WILL work on the FPV Drone, but will NOT work for Air Units or Vistas.

These are SIGNIFICANT problems in my book.  I have flown FPV for 6 years now, and I was considering buying the package.  But after finding these things out, I think I am going to PASS.

Dang, the geo fencing and elevation limitations suck big time! Honestly, I could live with geofencing, but the altitude limiter is almost enough to make me want to return the one I ordered. I mean, for craps sake has DJI not seen mountain surfing videos? I want to do that! Maybe not at first of course because I need a ton of practice, but it was definitely on my agenda. Heck, it's one of the thinks I hate about my Mavic 2 Pro. Honestly, the height limiter in their drones is my #1 beef with DJI.

I'm also disappointed by the fact that the controller won't work with air units - I had planned on maybe getting into building DIY FPV drones and being able to use the bundle I just purchased with that to keep the costs down.  

I'd already worked out the DJI care cost, and honestly it's hard to want to pay for what is essentially a 30% discount off a replacement drone. Instead, I'm going to invest time in playing the simulator fly only in sport mode to start with.

Are you sure about the spare arms/motors? I'd heard that they were going to be sold, so maybe they'll be added to the store when DJI has available stock? Would be great if a DJI rep could jump in here and confirm.

I totally agree with you that these are some serious issues, and they're on top of the bugs that some reviewers have been encountered where software bugs crash and destroy the drone, among other bad glitches. My drone is on the way, so I couldn't cancel the order if I wanted, but I'm definitely thinking that maybe I should have waited a few days before buying - guess that will teach me to beware FOMO! I do still want the drone, and will probably keep it rather than sending it back to DJI, but every day I learn some new caveat that dampens my enthusiasm.

I was so looking forward to pressing the "Buy" button but after looking at all the reviews, issues & limitations of this system it really is not worth the £1200+ price tag
A FPV drone is inherently higher risk flying and crashes are more common because of the style of flying that comes with FPV so why did they not make this more user repairable? Oh yeah that's it £££!

More problems worth discussing.
Battery life- You won't get anywhere near 20 minutes especially when pushing the drone in manual. 10-12 Minutes is what is being reported.
Cost of additional batteries - £150 each! Lets face it you are going to want extra's so another £300.
Battery durability - The legs are part of the battery and it has been reported that even a slightly hard landing breaks the battery.
Cost of repair - So expensive especially when crashes will be more common.

not having spare parts is a big problem.....and geo fencing is simply castrating your rights

Thanks for sharing.

HDPS Posted at 3-4 21:21
not having spare parts is a big problem.....and geo fencing is simply castrating your rights

..or adhering to the law , you could look at it that way of course :-)

I'm hoping #3 and #6 can be addressed with a sooner than later firmware update. As for spare parts #5 like arms and motors I hope DJI re-considers and sells them in the near future.
Geo-fencing I understand because they are bringing this to the general public at a large scale and could be liable in some way or at the very least get a lot of negative press when people start FPVing around restricted areas. Where mostly before FPV drones required that you build your own, yes there were places that would build one for you but at very small scale.

I've flown since 2013 and this is the greatest FPV thing that has come to the FPV world.  Low-latency, excellent feed quality, RTH and other things.  I haven't FPV flown far beyond yet because I'm used to the feed going crap at distance w/ stuttering on the DJI RE with the M2.  The lag on that is also insanely bad.  I need to becareful though for the 85mph runs.  Prob never do it at ground level.  Things could go wrong fast.

This drone is a bum steer in my view I buy most of their stuff but not this one

You forgot to mention. THERE IS NO SIMULATOR AVAILABLE FOR ANDROID USERS!!! Completely unacceptable DJI, this is not 2008, wtf!?!? so furious about finding this out after ordering.

kevinkillsit Posted at 3-6 15:55
You forgot to mention. THERE IS NO SIMULATOR AVAILABLE FOR ANDROID USERS!!! Completely unacceptable DJI, this is not 2008, wtf!?!? so furious about finding this out after ordering.

Even so, there are many other non-dji simulators that you can use to learn acro mode.  

The whole 500 meter thing and geofencing is a load of crap for all their products and is why I don't rely on them for professional use in the USA, amateur class only.  It is not illegal to fly a drone up the side of a mountain maintaining 400' AGL to 18000 feet.

kevinkillsit Posted at 3-6 15:55
You forgot to mention. THERE IS NO SIMULATOR AVAILABLE FOR ANDROID USERS!!! Completely unacceptable DJI, this is not 2008, wtf!?!? so furious about finding this out after ordering.

Dang, I did not know this  - that really sucks! I had planned on using that to learn manual FPV flight.

I have quite a lot of DJI product, flight controllers and propulsion systems, but the last drone I bought of theirs was a Phantom 2 as you could fly it in manual mode. I like to fly not be a passenger so I didn’t go the Mavic route. I really thought that the DJI FPV Drone would be my Mavic but I’ve now made my mind up and it’s a very big no. The reason is the batteries. In the UK, with the current exchange rate, they are $192 each. I have a reasonably sized fleet of 5inch and 7inch freestyle quads all of which use the same batteries. For a decent thrash around I would take about 10 charged packs with me, total cost less than $100. DJI claim that their batteries give 20mins of flight which might be the case if just pottering around in normal mode. But when in full manual mode with some ragging that time is now just six to eight minutes. So if I want a decent session with the DJI drone I’d have to spend close to $2,000 on batteries alone.

I consider this drone release, like much of most DJI initial drone releases, to be a PayToPlay Beta test and in the next year or so a version 2 will be released, and like all of DJI’s successive releases there will be no backward compatibility. Not too dissimilar to the Mini and the Mini2.

Would be good if DJI Technical support would use their voice and address the issues in the first posting?

They NEVER do. They just cut and paste nonsense as replies (if they reply at all).  DJI's attitude with customers is "take it or leave it".  This is too bad, because there us a wealth of knowledge in the FPV community they could benefit from.

The DJI FPV drone is on another level.  It's like a fast FPV Wing VTOL w/ no jello, no lag w/ incredible feed and recording, and full RTH capabilities for distant flight confidence.  It's hard to describe and cannot be compared imo.  I've used many different RC types and this is the newest greatest thing to ever happen to the RC hobby.  The headaches and fear of the other stuff is all gone.  It's super turn-key.  I look forward to flying everyday to be honest.  In fact, multiple times a day driving to locations even after recharging 3 batts at home after every flight.

Where can one find a map of the US that shows where you can fly a drone and not?

AntDX316 Posted at 3-8 20:14
The DJI FPV drone is on another level.  It's like a fast FPV Wing VTOL w/ no jello, no lag w/ incredible feed and recording, and full RTH capabilities for distant flight confidence.  It's hard to describe and cannot be compared imo.  I've used many different RC types and this is the newest greatest thing to ever happen to the RC hobby.  The headaches and fear of the other stuff is all gone.  It's super turn-key.  I look forward to flying everyday to be honest.  In fact, multiple times a day driving to locations even after recharging 3 batts at home after every flight.

You do realise that it’s not doing anything more than most FPV quads.

My most recent 7inch Long Range build, including GPS RTH, 4K 30FPS with image stabilisation camera, and a radio system that’s good to more than 20km, was less than a half of what you paid for the DJI quad, and that includes the cost of a battery and controller.
And for the price of your three DJI batteries I can get ten or more same spec’d batteries for this quad, that will provide similar flight times. And even with the most basic tune it surpasses the flight characteristics of the DJI Quad. Also in a hard crash I’ll probably only bend the odd prop or two, not shatter it into a thousand pieces.

I’m not knocking the folk whom have bought into this DJI system, you just need to realise you are paying a very hefty premium to have an electronic babysitter onboard. And to add the odds are very high that DJI will be releasing a Version2 of this system this time next year which your V1 hardware will not be compatible with. Examples? Mavic Mini2 was released a year after the original Mini. Next to nothing is interchangeable between these two models.

Honestly? If it wasn’t for the ridiculous price of the batteries and the fact that they are proprietary I would have bought this drone. It would have been my version of the Mavic Pro. But to get any meaningful flight session from this drone I would need to spend close to $2,000 on batteries where as for my quad, and similar PNF quads I doubt I’d have to break more than $200. I can also charge four at once in less than an hour, where as DJI will only let you charge one at a time.

I’m honestly very pleased that your so excited by this drone and the amount of fun you are having with it. To that end it’s doing exactly what DJI promised to you. However once you find yourself becoming more proficient with it in manual mode, and no longer using the emergency “OHH CRAP!!!” button, I hope you’ll take on the challenge of a true FPV quad. The fun and excitement will be exponentially greater, and you won’t have the fear of an expensive repair Bill should you crash.

Simple solution to the Mountain issue is to land the drone half way and take off again, I havent tested this but it would seem logical. That gives you 1klm. Its 500m from takeoff point Haven't tried reset home to see if it does the same thing yet. Just do multi stage flights. This drone does expand the 120M legal altitude limit by a factor of 4+ so I am not sure whay they did the limit in the first place for this one.

Nidge Posted at 3-9 02:11
You do realise that it’s not doing anything more than most FPV quads.

My most recent 7inch Long Range build, including GPS RTH, 4K 30FPS with image stabilisation camera, and a radio system that’s good to more than 20km, was less than a half of what you paid for the DJI quad, and that includes the cost of a battery and controller.

So now my interest in peaked.
I’m from the days if you wanted to fly you ordered a box of wood, glued it together and ironed on covering.
I’m all for homebuilt.

I would like to avoid wallowing through the mud so a forum or site regarding this would be much appreciated.

Thanks

bjr981s Posted at 3-9 02:25
Simple solution to the Mountain issue is to land the drone half way and take off again, I havent tested this but it would seem logical. That gives you 1klm. Its 500m from takeoff point Haven't tried reset home to see if it does the same thing yet. Just do multi stage flights. This drone does expand the 120M legal altitude limit by a factor of 4+ so I am not sure whay they did the limit in the first place for this one.

Might work but from what I have read you have about eight minutes to get everything completed.
Take off, find a place to land, take off, record what you want and get it back to the correct home point.

Nidge Posted at 3-9 02:11
You do realise that it’s not doing anything more than most FPV quads.

My most recent 7inch Long Range build, including GPS RTH, 4K 30FPS with image stabilisation camera, and a radio system that’s good to more than 20km, was less than a half of what you paid for the DJI quad, and that includes the cost of a battery and controller.

The main issue with DIY is, things could go wrong.  You could have a setting wrong, the feed is crap, the tune is crap, etc.  With the DJI FPV, it's turn-key and works perfectly.

bjr981s Posted at 3-9 02:25
Simple solution to the Mountain issue is to land the drone half way and take off again, I havent tested this but it would seem logical. That gives you 1klm. Its 500m from takeoff point Haven't tried reset home to see if it does the same thing yet. Just do multi stage flights. This drone does expand the 120M legal altitude limit by a factor of 4+ so I am not sure whay they did the limit in the first place for this one.

Big problem with that is finding a place to land - unfortunately flat, open ground is a little hard to come by on some mountains!

Took me all day to convince DJI they sent me a brick.   They make the return slow and  painful.

Illuminations Posted at 3-9 13:48
Big problem with that is finding a place to land - unfortunately flat, open ground is a little hard to come by on some mountains!

Yes, the hard part is that the camera will not tilt down 90 degrees so you can actually hover over the landing zone.

mc, I think you probably could list many more points here that are not so good, especailly if I see all the comments on activation, lack of support etc.
For some that will be acceptable, for others not.

For me it helped, so thanks a lot - I still decided to buy and become kind of a beta tester ;)

yeah the limitation with HDMI out only on the drone is just redicilus, looks like DJI wants to reserve this features in hope of forcing peoples to buy the drone ? .. no idea really why that is.. plus they never fixed the ongoing problems with Air Units
such as air-units not manage sd cards properly, no audio (the hardware suports audio but the software doesnt)
no audio recording in 720p and the audio track is always offset ..
thats just beta-type-problems but they never got  fixed. (probably in favour of the dji-fpv drone development)
makes me wonder where the Air Unit is heading ..

I have to say that I purchased the latest DJI FPV combo and it’s pretty disappointing. It loses signal within 1km and isn’t that fast.
I also have a phantom and a maverick that I much prefer.
What can I say I have buyers remorse