Weirdness after DJI Go4 Installation

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Hopefully someone can shed light on this.

I flew my Phantom 4 today the first time in 10 months. The last time I flew it was in the South Pacific where I calibrated the compass before the flight and had no issues.

After installing the DJI Go4 app (my firmware is still the old firmware from almost a year ago) I tried to calibrate the compass by tapping on the menu with the compass menu, but the compass said "normal" and there was no option I saw to calibrate it. The DJI Go app also said there was a restriction of 50 meters and 30 meters high. I closed this error window and tried to fly. The drone flew fine even with the compass calibration from the South Pacific! I also flew it well over 50 meters with no issues. What the heck?

So here are a couple of questions I hope you all can help me with.
1. Is the restriction error message only a message? Is it somehow enforced? I'm worried as I will be taking the drone again to the South Pacific in about a week and I don't want any issues.

2. What is going on with the Compass calibration? Why did it allow me to fly in Southern California when the last compass calibration was in the South Pacific? Why couldn't I access the compass calibration routine?

Any help is appreciated. I had no issues with the old DJI Go app, but my iPad automatically upgraded the DJI Go app, and I was forced to go to the DJO Go 4 app. The app wants me to upgrade the firmware, and I wouldn't normally have an issue with this except with all the issues with the firmware I hear about, I don't want any trouble this close to vacation.

Thanks
 
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After the last update there have been a lot of guys with the same problems. I think the fix has been log out of the app and close it. Once you start it back up and log back in you should be ok.
 
2. What is going on with the Compass calibration? Why did it allow me to fly in Southern California when the last compass calibration was in the South Pacific? Why couldn't I access the compass calibration routine?
Because you never needed to recalibrate your compass.
The idea that you should was always just a myth started by poor wording in early manuals.
Here's what the current P4 manual has to say:
i-PTkhBsS-M.jpg

You'll note there's no mention of doing it before you first fly, after updates or travelling any distance.
If you bolt a set of spotlights under your Phantom and really need to calibrate the compass, the calibration procedure is still there but you have to go into the app settings to find it.
 
After the last update there have been a lot of guys with the same problems. I think the fix has been log out of the app and close it. Once you start it back up and log back in you should be ok.
Is that for the issue of flight restriction message or the compass issue.
 
Because you never needed to recalibrate your compass.
The idea that you should was always just a myth started by poor wording in early manuals.
Here's what the current P4 manual has to say:
i-PTkhBsS-M.jpg

You'll note there's no mention of doing it before you first fly, after updates or travelling any distance.
If you bolt a set of spotlights under your Phantom and really need to calibrate the compass, the calibration procedure is still there but you have to go into the app settings to find it.
Interesting. I guess I need to download the new manual and get rid of the old one. Thanks.
 
Just FYI, I do not have the latest firmware installed and I get that restricted flight message too. I ignore it and fly normally. I tried logging out of the app, my DJI account and rebooting and sign on again but it still shows up.
 
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I am disgusted with DJI 4. Disappearing maps, strange errors, Strange warnings. So. I use Litchi 99% of the time. Google maps clean interface and programmable missions. I thought I would find tripod mode useful, but no. If you learn how to properly fly, you do not need tripod mode.
 
Because you never needed to recalibrate your compass.
The idea that you should was always just a myth started by poor wording in early manuals.
Here's what the current P4 manual has to say:
i-PTkhBsS-M.jpg

You'll note there's no mention of doing it before you first fly, after updates or travelling any distance.
If you bolt a set of spotlights under your Phantom and really need to calibrate the compass, the calibration procedure is still there but you have to go into the app settings to find it.


I just reviewed the v1.6 manual. Although it does say you don't need to calibrate the compass, later in the manual it does say to calibrate the compass if the aircraft was moved a significant distance. In this case it was moved half way around the world, but interestingly it seemed to fly fine. Someone did point out the menu that gets me into the compass calibration. Thanks to everyone for the help.
 
Just FYI, I do not have the latest firmware installed and I get that restricted flight message too. I ignore it and fly normally. I tried logging out of the app, my DJI account and rebooting and sign on again but it still shows up.

Good to know. Although it flew OK last weekend I would hate for it to start restricting flight on vacation where I have no way to really work on the issue.
 
I just reviewed the v1.6 manual. Although it does say you don't need to calibrate the compass, later in the manual it does say to calibrate the compass if the aircraft was moved a significant distance. In this case it was moved half way around the world, but interestingly it seemed to fly fine. Someone did point out the menu that gets me into the compass calibration. Thanks to everyone for the help.
Thanks for pointing that out.
DJI make great drones but the quality control on the manuals leaves a bit to be desired.
They corrected some manuals properly but it looks like they forgot to remove the original misleading info in the P4 manual after they added the newer, more correct text.
The P4 pro has exactly the same compass system as the P4 and you'll see they took that section out completely in the P4 pro manual: https://dl.djicdn.com/downloads/phantom_4_pro/20170719/Phantom_4_Pro_Pro_Plus_User_Manual_EN.pdf
(P57-58)
As you've already seen the Phantom doesn't require recalibration of the compass because of travel distance.
As long as it's flying straight and hovers without slowly spiraling, your compass is fine.
 
8AA44F16-AC26-47F9-ADB0-409A32731BDB.png
779C22D6-4605-4A86-BAE5-0390B46999C1.png


I never recommend inconsistent software/hardware/firmware situations. It sounded like you updated your DJI Go 4 software but did not attend to getting your firmware up-to-date. Above is DJI’s list of current upgrades. I would not bet that DJI tests all permiations and combinations of update levels across AC, RC, and DJI Go 4 device. Stick with what is listed as current to have a better chance that the environment you have was tested together by DJI. It’s your drone, it was expensive ... so the extra effort is worth it.
 
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I've found you can set a distance limit at 5000m instead of just leaving it at the default of 0 in the Phantom settings as well. Probably not the best way to do it though. Logging in and out of the app is the better fix.
 
Update:
Just logging on as I was traveling with no internet.

Anyways I took the drone out, calibrated the compass as it said to do so. I flew it around a lagoon going to about 300 meters from shore and about 120 meters high. I took pics and video. Deciding to bring it down in altitude to do some more shots I got an error that the drone was disconnected. This happened at 267 meters from shore and 58 meters high. I waited for it to reconnect. Nothing. Visually it was against a cloudy horizon so I really couldn’t see it. I waited for it to RTH figuring this would work. Nothing.

Drone gone. No sign of it. I can only figure something catastrophic failed in the aircraft. I only got about a dozen trouble free flights out of this. Was it a quality issue or something to do with the DJI updates...who knows.

This was a very expensive lesson on buying something like this. I’m done with DJI for sure. Probably done with drones as well unless another company comes out with a more reliable drone that is less expensive.
 
You need to download your flight records and let the experts here take a look at them and see if anything glaring went wrong.
 
Drone gone. No sign of it. I can only figure something catastrophic failed in the aircraft. I only got about a dozen trouble free flights out of this. Was it a quality issue or something to do with the DJI updates...who knows.
Who knows? Without looking at the recorded flight data no-one has any way of saying what happened.
This was a very expensive lesson on buying something like this. I’m done with DJI for sure. Probably done with drones as well unless another company comes out with a more reliable drone that is less expensive.
Without knowing the cause of the incident, it's premature blaming DJI. There are a number of possible explanations.
If you want to find out what happened and maybe learn from the experience and find out if it's a DJI problem or something else, go to DJI Flight Log Viewer
Follow the instructions there to upload your flight record from your phone or tablet.
Come back and post a link to the report it provides
 
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You need to download your flight records and let the experts here take a look at them and see if anything glaring went wrong.
I’ll do that when I get back to the states. Maybe it will help someone. Either way I’m done with DJI and probably droning. These things are too expensive to replace when they fail.
 

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