After flying many times the Hubsan X4, and having lots of crashes, the board has been affected somehow. You can also buy the spare board, but I decided to upgrade to the Hubsan X4 with camera, to give it a try, also from banggood.com.
It flights a bit better, and despite being a bit bigger and heavier, it stills hold in the air for 7 minutes or so. It is fast and strongest, as it has been improved to not break easily. It is very rare you need to replace a motor with this quadcopter. The most common fix is replacing the propellers, but you can also buy the propeller protector, really useful.
The camera has low resolution and forget about watching in full screen! You have to keep the quad really quiet on air to have some kind of smooth video, otherwise it seems a bee holds the camera! :) There's a new version with 2MP camera though.
I'll try to upload my own video, but in the meanwhile you can check the video quality here.
I have now 12 batteries for the Hubsan X4, so I can fly for more than an hour and a half :). This is a great way of practicing for when the real quadcopter comes.
In the meanwhile, I take the Hubsan with me almost everywhere I go and fly for a while. In my last trip, to Switzerland, we both went to Zermatt and hike with the magnificent views of the Matterhorn!
I had a few crashes and broke a motor, so I had to replace it on my way back.
The Hubsan X4 has been my first quadcopter :) I had other indoor helicopters in the past
but this Hubsan X4 is really really worth it. I have bought at banggood.com, it takes around two weeks until you receive it, but is not pricy. My transmitter was faulty but they sent me another one really quick.
It has two modes, normal and expert. You don't normally need the expert mode unless it's really windy outside. This quad is small but it flies amazingly well!! It is super fun!! I recommend to purchase at least a 5 battery pack (380mAh) to enjoy flying for a while. The duration of a battery is around 7 or 8 minutes, and it takes 45 minutes for full charge.
I also recomment to buy some extra propellers, and the 5 in 1 charger battery wire. It takes about 3 or 4 hours to charge them all with the wire, but you don't need to check them every 45 minutes, it's just useful.
Please take a look at this video before flying, these tips will save you some bucks for sure!
After some crashes you will notice the quad is not flying properly, or it doesn't stand quiet when trying to keep it at the same spot. You will need to check the propellers haven't been bended, and calibrate it in order to (probably) solve this. Take a look this video to see how to do it:
I have also bought a soldering iron, tin, and a third arm in order to fix when the motors brake. It is really easy to do, and will allow you to continue flying in no time!
