I have no idea, but if you are prosumer and you use your Phantom for work I don't think this one will be for you.
The ecosystem that DJI ahs built is going to take quite a bit of time to match for the prosumer market.
I never bought into DJI I disliked the fact that they tried to mask the fact that they were Chinese at first and at those prices i rather had to have something semi-custom built and finish it my self.
What DJI did was great they produced pretty much the first (commercially successful) out of the box can be used by anyone (children to professional photographers) drone with a good ecosystem - basically the "iPhone of drones", but they always priced it too high for what it was (the prices oddly enough have been dropping for the past few weeks and a full DJI P3 4K drone kit with extra blades, 3-axis gimble and the works can be had under 600GBP in the UK, I don't know if it's just because the summer is coming or DJI knew about this) especially considering the amount of accessories you usually had to buy ontop of the base kit to make any use of the damn thing.
Considering we also don't know how this drone performs yet and that they'll be crowdfunding it initially I don't think you should wait if you really need to upgrade (also why upgrade the P3? It's still one of the best drones around) do it, I'm not sure if I would ever get the Xiaomi drone either but it's good to see that big Chinese companies are getting into the market because there is nothing wrong with Chinese companies but there's also no reason for what so ever to price serially produced drones that can cost <100$ in BOM at a 1000$ or higher...
Definitely not using it for work; youtube videos at best.. love my P3S. Was able to fly for the first time within an hour at a tennis/golf retreat. Would only upgrade to get the further range.
If you want more range for the Wifi look at Wifi boosters for the DJI P4, other than that I don't really think you will get more range.
I know people with both and the flight time is pretty much identical 25~ min or so, even tho the P4 has officially 2-3min longer flight time it doesn't seem to really express it self that much in reality.
Xiaomi has officially said they have no plans to enter US markets with their phones at least and considering this "depends" on their phones for now I don't think any time soon, at least officially.
Unofficially, of course, you'll be able to order it off AliExpress/eBay/etc in a few weeks after release and I'm sure someone will reverse engineer it a bit and produce a modified apk that can be used to control these things.
The press release said that the Mi phone was used as the view finder, that's an Android phone no where in the article did it say that it would not be compatible with other Android phones in the least.
I would really surprise me if Xiaomi would even attempt at locking this to it's phones only, it makes absolutely no sense for them that said since many Mi phones cost less than 150-200$ and most people i know that fly DJI's have a dedicated tablet for it, it still would be considerably cheaper than the DJI phantom if it could manage to come close to it performance wise.
They have an english site but nowhere on that site do they sell phones to the US. They may sell some other products (for example, their headphones, I know they offer warranty in the US on them at least, but I can't seem to find a store page on their site).
They said "uses your Mi smartphone as its viewfinder". Hard to say for certain, but that line makes me think they're trying to lock it. Other manufacturers have done similar stupid things, so it wouldn't really surprise me.
Again I don't know much about the US market, but they do have FCC approval and it seems that they do have direct marketing sales in the US.
The biggest problem I see is that their phones for the most part are EU/ASIA focused which means that LTE won't work on most US networks, and US only bands won't be supported either.
Comments
When would we likely see this in the states?
May hold on upgrading from my Phantom 3 Standard to Phantom 4 in lieu of an alternative at 1/3 cost..
I have no idea, but if you are prosumer and you use your Phantom for work I don't think this one will be for you. The ecosystem that DJI ahs built is going to take quite a bit of time to match for the prosumer market.
I never bought into DJI I disliked the fact that they tried to mask the fact that they were Chinese at first and at those prices i rather had to have something semi-custom built and finish it my self.
What DJI did was great they produced pretty much the first (commercially successful) out of the box can be used by anyone (children to professional photographers) drone with a good ecosystem - basically the "iPhone of drones", but they always priced it too high for what it was (the prices oddly enough have been dropping for the past few weeks and a full DJI P3 4K drone kit with extra blades, 3-axis gimble and the works can be had under 600GBP in the UK, I don't know if it's just because the summer is coming or DJI knew about this) especially considering the amount of accessories you usually had to buy ontop of the base kit to make any use of the damn thing.
Considering we also don't know how this drone performs yet and that they'll be crowdfunding it initially I don't think you should wait if you really need to upgrade (also why upgrade the P3? It's still one of the best drones around) do it, I'm not sure if I would ever get the Xiaomi drone either but it's good to see that big Chinese companies are getting into the market because there is nothing wrong with Chinese companies but there's also no reason for what so ever to price serially produced drones that can cost <100$ in BOM at a 1000$ or higher...
Definitely not using it for work; youtube videos at best.. love my P3S. Was able to fly for the first time within an hour at a tennis/golf retreat. Would only upgrade to get the further range.
Said video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mucjAyPrKOU
If you want more range for the Wifi look at Wifi boosters for the DJI P4, other than that I don't really think you will get more range. I know people with both and the flight time is pretty much identical 25~ min or so, even tho the P4 has officially 2-3min longer flight time it doesn't seem to really express it self that much in reality.
Would you happen to have a link for where the P3 4K is for £600? After some bad experiences with a Quanum Nova, I'd like to try a DJI instead.
Xiaomi has officially said they have no plans to enter US markets with their phones at least and considering this "depends" on their phones for now I don't think any time soon, at least officially.
Unofficially, of course, you'll be able to order it off AliExpress/eBay/etc in a few weeks after release and I'm sure someone will reverse engineer it a bit and produce a modified apk that can be used to control these things.
The press release said that the Mi phone was used as the view finder, that's an Android phone no where in the article did it say that it would not be compatible with other Android phones in the least. I would really surprise me if Xiaomi would even attempt at locking this to it's phones only, it makes absolutely no sense for them that said since many Mi phones cost less than 150-200$ and most people i know that fly DJI's have a dedicated tablet for it, it still would be considerably cheaper than the DJI phantom if it could manage to come close to it performance wise.
P.S. While I'm not an American Xiaomi does has a US store http://www.mi.com/en/
They have an english site but nowhere on that site do they sell phones to the US. They may sell some other products (for example, their headphones, I know they offer warranty in the US on them at least, but I can't seem to find a store page on their site).
They said "uses your Mi smartphone as its viewfinder". Hard to say for certain, but that line makes me think they're trying to lock it. Other manufacturers have done similar stupid things, so it wouldn't really surprise me.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/1/10885500/us-mobile-xiaomi-m...
Again I don't know much about the US market, but they do have FCC approval and it seems that they do have direct marketing sales in the US. The biggest problem I see is that their phones for the most part are EU/ASIA focused which means that LTE won't work on most US networks, and US only bands won't be supported either.
just buy on gearbest.com