Should I wait for P5 or buying P4P/P4R?

[hikingbears]

Hi guys, I'm new to the forum but I have had my P3 Standard for about a year. I enjoy flying and want to upgrade for better photo/video quality and longer distance. I have a hard time making a decision here...

I googled but couldn't find any information about P5, not even a piece of leaked news. Can I assume it won't be out in the near future (2017)? Is it worth waiting for P5?

Right now P4 Refurbished is CAD $899 (~CAD $1000 after tax) in Canada and it's such a great deal. For P4P, I can order it directly from DJI, 10% off educational discount, which comes to around US $1349 (CAD $1825) all in. It's still good considering 10% off and the price includes all tax/duty when being shipped to Canada, but can the big price difference be justified? I read some threads and learned that 4K60FPS is 'fake' on P4P and I'm a bit disappointed for such a high-end product.

Any thoughts?

 

[inkytog]

If you need it now, buy it now.

 

[hikingbears]

If you need it now, buy it now.

If I buy it now, which one you suggest? P4P or P4R? Thanks.

 

[inkytog]

P4P

It's not fake 4K at 30p. It uses pixel binning at 60p to maintain the 100mb/s data rate.

 

[CanadaGoose]

The P4p has a terrific camera for stills, see the attached photo. I've only done a few video clips 4k@30fps and have been very happy so far. The P5 will no doubt come out at some point but it might not be for some time and it's late spring now and perfect for taking aerial stills/video. Seeing you are in British Columbia I would guess you have access to some beautiful places. The $1825 price is extremely good and if I were you I'd jump on it and get flying rather than wait and hope for something better down the road. But how much better can it get? Maybe different camera options, retracting landing gear and so on. Trouble is if you wait hoping for something better to come out you'll never get anywhere so grab the bull by the horns and bite the bullet

 

[andy_k]

Wait for the P6 - it will be brilliant

 

[hikingbears]

P4P

It's not fake 4K at 30p. It uses pixel binning at 60p to maintain the 100mb/s data rate.

Thanks. Any microSD card can have a speed of more than 100mb/s?

 

[andy_k]

it's not necessarily about the micro SD, it's how fast the camera can process the data

 

[hikingbears]

The P4p has a terrific camera for stills, see the attached photo. I've only done a few video clips 4k@30fps and have been very happy so far. The P5 will no doubt come out at some point but it might not be for some time and it's late spring now and perfect for taking aerial stills/video. Seeing you are in British Columbia I would guess you have access to some beautiful places. The $1825 price is extremely good and if I were you I'd jump on it and get flying rather than wait and hope for something better down the road. But how much better can it get? Maybe different camera options, retracting landing gear and so on. Trouble is if you wait hoping for something better to come out you'll never get anywhere so grab the bull by the horns and bite the bullet View attachment 82882

What an awesome shot! Yeah, you are right. My vacation is coming up in early July and I hope I can practice a bit in June and get ready. Do you think DJI Care Refresh is useful? Have you noticed any problem from your P4P yet?

 

[JCustoms]

I highly recommend the P4P the video quality and still photos are astonishing. However i know you would save a $140 with the student discount buying it from DJI however i would recommend buying it from Best Buy or Amazon due to their return policy. I purchased mine from Best Buy had to return 2 drones due to some issues in their manufacturing and my third one was a winner. If you do purchase it from DJI and there are any issues with the drone it will be a hassle to deal with them as you will have to return the drone they have to do some testing and see the issue they might fix it or replace it with a re manufactured drone. As i had some issues with the Osmo + and it took a couple of months back and forth to get a newer one replaced. However with all that said once you do get a good P4P i am sure you will fall in love with the quality

 

[hikingbears]

I highly recommend the P4P the video quality and still photos are astonishing. However i know you would save a $140 with the student discount buying it from DJI however i would recommend buying it from Best Buy or Amazon due to their return policy. I purchased mine from Best Buy had to return 2 drones due to some issues in their manufacturing and my third one was a winner. If you do purchase it from DJI and there are any issues with the drone it will be a hassle to deal with them as you will have to return the drone they have to do some testing and see the issue they might fix it or replace it with a re manufactured drone. As i had some issues with the Osmo + and it took a couple of months back and forth to get a newer one replaced. However with all that said once you do get a good P4P i am sure you will fall in love with the quality

Thanks man. Can you share what to look at and how to test it to see if it is perfect when I get my P4P?? I'm wondering what the potential problems are.

 

[John Locke]

You definitely don't want to wait for a P5. If it came out tomorrow it would take six months for DJI to sort out the firmware, that's just the reality of DJI pushing the technology envelope. The P4P is really close to being bug free, but there's still more to do. The remaining issues are tolerable for most, but we still yearn for more progress. I just bought my P4P last weekend because I've been waiting and waiting for things to get resolved. So far my new craft has worked very good. I bought from Best Buy to exchange if needed, but I think I got a good one.

 

[hikingbears]

You definitely don't want to wait for a P5. If it came out tomorrow it would take six months for DJI to sort out the firmware, that's just the reality of DJI pushing the technology envelope. The P4P is really close to being bug free, but there's still more to do. The remaining issues are tolerable for most, but we still yearn for more progress. I just bought my P4P last weekend because I've been waiting and waiting for things to get resolved. So far my new craft has worked very good. I bought from Best Buy to exchange if needed, but I think I got a good one.

Thanks. Ya I think waiting for P5 is not practical at all and I will pull the trigger soon.
Best Buy Canada states "Drones may be returned or exchanged as long as it remains unopened", so it seems they cannot do anything even if the drone has problems. Do you mind sharing what/how to test when I receive the drone? Do you think DJI Care Refresh is worth it?

 

[John Locke]

Do you mind sharing what/how to test when I receive the drone? Do you think DJI Care Refresh is worth it?

Here are the things to test on a P4P:
1. Gimbal flip, some are worse than others. During a high speed S mode flight, turn hard left. The gimbal will likely flip sideways. You can slow it down and see how fast you can to without a flip. Some craft will exhibit the gimbal flip with simply turn quick left or right during a hover.
2. Flying sideways. See how fast you can fly sideways before the camera horizon will tilt. some are worse than others.
3. 4K video recording. If 4K recording is important to you, some cameras will have glitches during 4K recordings. I believe this is the inability of the camera to sustain 100mbps write speeds. This is only 12.5MB/sec, and most high end cards write at 60+MB/sec. Most cards should handle this, but it's advised to buy the fasted write speed card you can find. Sandisk and Samsung offer high quality SD cards, assuming you don't get a counterfeit card. I don't think this is a problem with 1080 recordings, only 4K.
4. FALSE WIND WARNINGS is an annoyance for all craft. All craft have this. I deem it a firmware/application bug until DJI allows me to turn off the wind warnings. It's so stupid, and inaccurate.

As for DJIs refresh policy, I'm out to jury on that. I bought one for my Mavic and this delayed things. I had a warranty claim and they want me to use one of my refresh claims and pay $79 to fix the craft. I said no, the craft has never been crashed, dropped or mishandled. Show me your justification for denying my warranty coverage. This went on for 2wks until they finally agreed to cover it under warranty. So I had a bad experience. However, if you crash your craft, there's no doubt it will be worth the cost of the program. If you're a beginner, it's likely worth buying it. If you've been flying for a couple years and never crashed, it may not be worth buying. My luck has been good and haven't crashed in over a year, but that doesn't mean you will never have a collision with a bird or a power wire you don't see. If you fly a lot like me, almost every weekend and many weekdays in the summer, it can be a good insurance policy. Only you can decide what your risk level is.

 

[Buzz In California]

I highly recommend the P4P the video quality and still photos are astonishing. However i know you would save a $140 with the student discount buying it from DJI however i would recommend buying it from Best Buy or Amazon due to their return policy. I purchased mine from Best Buy had to return 2 drones due to some issues in their manufacturing and my third one was a winner. If you do purchase it from DJI and there are any issues with the drone it will be a hassle to deal with them as you will have to return the drone they have to do some testing and see the issue they might fix it or replace it with a re manufactured drone. As i had some issues with the Osmo + and it took a couple of months back and forth to get a newer one replaced. However with all that said once you do get a good P4P i am sure you will fall in love with the quality

Best Buy matches prices, ask the sales person if they will match DJI's 10% off

 

[Frankc]

Buy from Amazon. If there are problems returning it should be less of a hassle. Mine is going back, via Amazon.

 

[John Locke]

Best Buy matches prices, ask the sales person if they will match DJI's 10% off

GadgetGuy says BB has a new policy for returns, 15% charge. It seems BestBuy isn't competitive anymore.

 

[thatdjigeek]

Wait for the P6 - it will be brilliant

Nah, P7PPP FTW

 

[hikingbears]

Thank you guys for your help. I just pulled the trigger on the P4P. I ordered from DJI and it saved me CAD $530. I hope it'll be perfect bug-free bird. [emoji1] @John Locke, great thanks for your instruction how to test the new Drone.