After spending many hours troubleshooting and waiting days for responses from support I finally took back my first Solo the was eventually deemed defective by 3DR for a number of issues. It took another 2.5hrs at the retailer to perform the exchange and a 5 day wait with a 3 hour commute to pick up Solo #2 at the nearest retailer with inventory.
I will say that I was quite excited when unboxing #2 as the whole process was extremely smooth compare the previous one. in less then 10 minutes #2 was updated to 1.05 and fully calibrated. It had 12-13 satelites registered and locked in seconds from startup. #1 took a minimum of 4-5 minutes if I was lucky to lock 6 for auto fly. Not to mention the controller showed full bars for solo connectivity and telemtry readings in the app were dead on.
With such good flight conditions before packing up the kids in the car to head over the field I decided to take #2 up and down just to confirm flight first. here is #2's first flight video 10 mins from coming out of the box.
Solo - $999
Gimbal(still haven't recieved) - $399
GoPro 4blk - $499
Xtra batterys - $597
spare parts - $80
40+hrs invested in troubleshooting/support and exchange of 1st Solo - $3000
Capturing this majestic first flight on video - Priceless!
Enjoy.
Replies
Bob -- 3DR is attempting to get fully into the consumer business. Indeed the Pixhawk Flight control code is the open source side of things and it will port straight to the Solo's Pixhawk 2.
The biggest part of the Solo is the rest of it: The WiFi contoller, and the companion computer, Go Pro control, as yet unreleased gimbal. That is all closed source as I understand it. And it is being done by a completely different set of Devs.
I am sure they will get this thing right at some point but right now it all seems a bit beta. Neither team is 'Done'. The Solo team is likely working night and day and under even more pressure than the APM dev team -- just my guess.
Bob, I don't think you understand the situation.
Nearly everything that Randy and the devs do benefits the Solo. The Pixhawk and Solo (Pixhawk2) both run versions of APM that are functionally very similar. Improvements to one are generally going to benefit both units. There is no wheel re-inventing going on, and both of them use the EKF "thing".
There is no Mustang and horse-cart. There is a mustang and then there is a slightly newer mustang with black paint that comes in a pretty box.
OMG you are kidding me..
I'm not going to go any further than say... you're dreamin buddy
As Phillip and others pointed out, Randy, Tridge and the other dev team leaders are all 3DR contractors, assigned to work on the open source code for the benefit of the community. They work daily with the internal 3DR Solo dev team to coordinate this. Think of Solo as the "advance team", which implements new features on specific hardware, which is then merged into the standard APM codebase once it's been tested on a wider range of hardware.
Randy, Tridge, Lorenz and team also work on core autopilot technology as part of the DroneCode umbrella, which helps all the companies that are part of DroneCode, including 3DR.
This is the standard way that all companies work with the open source project they sponsor. For instance, Google, Intel, IBM and others assign engineers to work on the core open source Linux platform, as well as internal engineers to build company-specific applications (such as Android) on top of Linux.
If its Open Source, then why are you violating GPL, by not releasing the full code?
GPL requires it, in fact you're currently only releasing bits and pieces.
As far as i can tell the companion computer is passing wifi command and pushing G Streamer... Not exactly groundbreaking dual computer processing.
But back to the matter of Solo code. Where is the next firmware that addresses the issues currently experienced... GPS loss, GPS drift. Props running after crash, Random bounces on landing?
Im tired of being a BETA tester for your overhyped product that cant even meet its release schedule.
Where are the backpacks that Colin Promised to hit the shelves last week? The Gimbal at the end of July?
Where is Solo 1.1 Final, or Solo1.2 Final.
Are we just going to continue to ignore the GPS being in the worst position possible, and the fact that since GoPro was first put on FPV flights there was known interference from its RF and recommendation of shielding the GoPro with Copper and placing it 13 inches away, Yet youve decided to set GPS right above it.
There is so much going on in the area of the GPS:
GoPro under emitting RF
Battery Blocking one entire GPS horizon
Battery Power wires directly beside
PC board also emitting RF under it
Oh and you run the wifi antenna under to the front leg.
Go ahead boot it up and set the controller down beside it so you can watch. Power on GoPro and watch it drop satellites.
Then turn on a wifi analyzer app and watch sololink when you turn on a GoPro. it loses 3-6 dbi that at minimum is halfing or leaving you with a quarter of the original signal.
Effectively nulling the 2-3dbi nub antennas on the controller.
There ya go, thats my R&D, done BETA testing... fix it, recall it, or refund it.
ETA: i have 62 flights on SOLO
I think the Solo-specific code is not open source.
But yes, your technical comments are very worrying for 3DR. I have read a lot of credible analysis to the same effect. It is not something that can be swept under the carpet. This smells of recall...not sure poor GPS location has a firmware fix.
Chris, I don't really care,,
My biggest gripe with you, and all 3DR, is that, when you buy a 3DR product, you have just unwillingly signed yourself up to the unofficial 3DR R&D team....
and from all the comments above, nothing has changed with the SOLO....
who's going to break the news to Art... that he's just put his money straight into your pocket... and been given a "work in progress"
and before you all say "open source" "we do it for nothing" blah blah,, where does it say on the solo webpage, that this thing is open source, and based on the same FW that is still evolving??
you have taken Arts money... sold him something he assumed was a done deal...
I left 3DR over a year ago to DJI.... I've only come back to get some use out of my old mothballed pixhawk,, by putting it on a heli... WHAT A JOKE
Mission Planner??? .....2/10
Telemetry???..... 3/10
DF13 cable connectors??? MY GOD!! wtf 1/10
your WIKI?? has completely false info all through it... 2/10
sometimes it boots up and connects,, sometimes it won't??? 2/10
guys go to DJI.com and have a look at what they have,, just look,, the NAZA V2 flies from an ipad... and it's extremely reliable... and been that way for a long time,,, if solo has all this stuff too... why are we not able to use it on our existing pixhawks?? no app?? why???
have you guys seen a DJI zenmuse gimbal?? would i put one with an expensive DSLR camera under a Pixhawk?? errr NOOOOO! I leave that to my A2,, thanks...
the best analogy I can use for 3DR Vs DJI, is the cable connector... that's it... just compare the cable connectors and it sums the whole thing up... (and you don't need a youtube video to show you how to unplug a DJI connector without tearing the wires out of the housing)
why don't you guys go do something useful... and clean up your wiki... it's OK if you live and breath 3DR all day long,, you keep up with the stuff ups... but if a newbie gets into it,,, it's a minefield of wrong info,, is it a pixhawk? or a PX4? telem1?? or telem2??
Rant over, don't reply... I won't read it... I'll be out flying my DJI... the only problem with it,, is it just WORKS.. can be boring after a while... nothing goes wrong??? just too easy...
PS. Art if you're next one screws up... foxtech P3 for 1/3 what you paid... sorry bud.. we all have to learn some lessons the hard way..
DJI Vs 3DR.JPG
Hi Bob, i'm sorry to contradict you, but i fly over a year with this DJI S1000 installing Pixhawk board and i never had a single problem.
I know very well A2, WKM, Naza and all the other DJI products because i have used and configured them many times.
This big bird has to his credit more than 1500 automatic mission without single issue.
And as you can see there's about $ 13,000 installed in the 3 axis gimbal (multispectral and thermal cam "combo").
It always depends on how you configure it, most of the causes of crashes are related to a wrong setup, wrong wiring, bad tuning and newbie pilot.
So said that APM:Copter doesn't work well perhaps means not knowing how to configure it properly.
The Solo is another product, i can't leave my feedback about it because i never tried.
About the connector: what is clear, i hate DF13, the new "Pixhawk 2" will have a special molex, much better.
Thanks Marc!
APM:Copter is a great code, but you also know how to configure it properly.
IMHO many times people don't appreciate it means that may not know what is flying... ;-)
Nice copter. (Bob's flying his Naza right now though, so he will not appreciate your fine machine)
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