Looking for a reasonable priced drone

Looking for a reasonable priced drone

Author
Discussion

AlfaCool

Original Poster:

88 posts

60 months

Saturday 9th November 2019
quotequote all
Hello all.
long time lurker, finally decided to sign up.
I'm looking for a drone for my daughter for Christmas, she doesn't want anything fancy or expensive.
She wants one with a camera that she can easily fly as a fun thing.
I guess up to £50 would be our budget.
Any suggestions please.

cati

200 posts

147 months

Saturday 9th November 2019
quotequote all
Reasonably priced isn’t 50quid to be honest. That’s toy grade so would try usual suspects

If you want a really good one mini mavic just realeased 350 quid and you could both have fun

pingu393

9,021 posts

212 months

Saturday 9th November 2019
quotequote all
Just be aware of the new rules coming into force on 30 November 2019. If it is for outside and weighs more than 250g...

If your daughter is under 18, you will be the "operator" and will need to register the drone at a cost of £9. You will need to stick your operator ID to the drone. She can be an "operator" when she is 18.

She will be the "pilot" and will need to complete an online test and obtain a flyer ID.

https://register-drones.caa.co.uk/

ColinM50

2,651 posts

182 months

Sunday 10th November 2019
quotequote all
I've got a Syma X5C-1 Upgraded version drone she can have. Bought it a couple of years ago and only used it a couple of times before buying a DJI Phantom 3 Professional. She can have the Syma for £35 or the Phantom for £420 complete with tablet so ready to go. Let me know if you want photos. I'm in St Neots Cambs

GroundZero

2,085 posts

61 months

Saturday 11th April 2020
quotequote all
Did a search for drones and this one popped up.

Just wanted to know how does a chinese made drone go about "spying" and sending back data to the communist party?
I am thinking about buying a drone, a smallish one such as a DJI Mavic Mini (or similar, because most of them are made in china).
So lets say that I don't connect the drone to the internet, nor the phone app to the internet (apart from the initial download and setup). Then this means there is no method for the drone or app to send data anywhere right?

The drone records video to an SD card and the phone app records transmitted video to its own SD card, no internet required and no method to spy?




Drawweight

3,096 posts

123 months

Sunday 12th April 2020
quotequote all
GroundZero said:
Did a search for drones and this one popped up.

Just wanted to know how does a chinese made drone go about "spying" and sending back data to the communist party?
I am thinking about buying a drone, a smallish one such as a DJI Mavic Mini (or similar, because most of them are made in china).
So lets say that I don't connect the drone to the internet, nor the phone app to the internet (apart from the initial download and setup). Then this means there is no method for the drone or app to send data anywhere right?

The drone records video to an SD card and the phone app records transmitted video to its own SD card, no internet required and no method to spy?
Well this is a new one on me.

I hadn’t even heard the theory that they monitor drones.

I can see why they have a huge population now with all the phones they are supposed to be eavesdropping on from all over the world and now looking at video from drones.

They must have zero unemployment biggrin

Phunk

2,017 posts

178 months

Sunday 12th April 2020
quotequote all
GroundZero said:
Did a search for drones and this one popped up.

Just wanted to know how does a chinese made drone go about "spying" and sending back data to the communist party?
I am thinking about buying a drone, a smallish one such as a DJI Mavic Mini (or similar, because most of them are made in china).
So lets say that I don't connect the drone to the internet, nor the phone app to the internet (apart from the initial download and setup). Then this means there is no method for the drone or app to send data anywhere right?

The drone records video to an SD card and the phone app records transmitted video to its own SD card, no internet required and no method to spy?
Correct, you can operate them without connecting to the internet.

Although it will mean that you'll miss out on firmware updates, which may/may not fix flying issues. A few years ago I missed a firmware update on a DJI Phantom which caused the drone to fall out of the sky 20 seconds after take off.

I wouldn't be too worried about DJI, they're the world leaders in drones, used by police forces, etc across the world. The drone will still record extremely detailed flight logs - so should it be found these can be downloaded by the CAA / Police.

pingu393

9,021 posts

212 months

Sunday 12th April 2020
quotequote all
Drawweight said:
GroundZero said:
Did a search for drones and this one popped up.

Just wanted to know how does a chinese made drone go about "spying" and sending back data to the communist party?
I am thinking about buying a drone, a smallish one such as a DJI Mavic Mini (or similar, because most of them are made in china).
So lets say that I don't connect the drone to the internet, nor the phone app to the internet (apart from the initial download and setup). Then this means there is no method for the drone or app to send data anywhere right?

The drone records video to an SD card and the phone app records transmitted video to its own SD card, no internet required and no method to spy?
Well this is a new one on me.

I hadn’t even heard the theory that they monitor drones.

I can see why they have a huge population now with all the phones they are supposed to be eavesdropping on from all over the world and now looking at video from drones.

They must have zero unemployment biggrin
Nobody would do it the way that you suggest. Software would monitor all the geo-data and if they found geo-data of lat/long that is close to an area of interest, they may get a human to investigate closer.

It is Big Brother stuff, but S.Korea and China have proved they have Big Brother capabilities. Just look at the daily COVID graphs and ask yourself why are S.Korea and China so much better at controlling the spread of the virus.

GroundZero

2,085 posts

61 months

Tuesday 14th April 2020
quotequote all
Drawweight said:
Well this is a new one on me.

I hadn’t even heard the theory that they monitor drones.
This is based up on the many possible "tin hat" stories on the internet.
But seems that if the US government are wanting to ban chinese drones from their market altogether, that it probably has some meat to it.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/05/20/politics/dhs-ch...
https://consent.yahoo.com/collectConsent?sessionId...
https://www.businessinsider.com/us-government-warn...
https://www.digitaltrends.com/news/department-of-i...
https://www.braveriver.com/dji-drones-may-be-spyin...

But I can only assume that to be able to steal any data that the drone and or the DJI app on your phone needs to be connected to the internet.
In that case I was wondering if the drone had its own wifi connection that it then connects to a home wifi (stealing password access from your phone app?), or wether the DJI app is using home wifi to send data back to the communists (even if I turn off its permissions on android).


Follow on question is, are there any good NON-chinese brand drones, competitively priced, fairly quiet and small size that I could buy with the aim that I could easily carry in a small rucksack when we go out and about in the countryside and on holidays?