Dromida Ominus Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) Quadcopter Ready-to-Fly (RTF) Drone with Radio System, Batteries and USB Charger (Red)

nothing against the ominus specifically. it flew ok. however, it got lost in the woods on our property and we never found it. my opinion is that it was definetly not "easy" to fly. i bought another copter. a highly rated "nano" one. it was equally difficult to fly. it seems one will tear the copter up before learning to fly it. not good for kids 12 years old or so. too much negative feedback trying to learn to fly one. i think we are average and i would say these copters are too hard to learn to fly. the youtube videos make it look easy. for us it was not! i don't recommend these quads to the normal person unless they have money to buy another one after the first one is too broken to fly. yes they are durable, but not as durable as advertized. one must be HIGHLY motivated to learn to fly. and conditions must be right.

Ahh, my first quadcopter. I've got to say, I'm really darn impressed with this thing. I'll probably write a more extended review later, but figured I should write a short blurb here today.I was introduced to the Ominus by searching for quadcopters on another website (hobby town usa). They didn't have the copters themselves, but they had tons of replacement parts. That caught my attention because most other quads I had seen previously were definitely more "toy grade" than this - if you break it, you might as well toss it, because there are no spare parts available. I went looking for this elsewhere and of course found it here on Amazon for the cheapest price available. I have since bought a Hubsan H107D, but I still enjoy flying this one as well. It's much larger, measuring about 10" diagonally between prop centers, where the Hubsan is about 4".The Ominus has much greater lift, and about 15 minutes of flight time per charge vs 5 minutes on for the Hubsan. I think the Ominus is a bit more stable and forgiving than the Hubsan, at least in Beginner Mode. I like that it has 4 different control modes, all the way up to Expert. I started getting pretty good recently, and switched into Expert Mode. Turns out I'm not that good after all, and I immediately crashed :) Apparently in Expert Mode, all the onboard gyros and stabilization are turned off, and all of that is left to the pilot. I'm SO not ready for that yet. However, it's nice to know that it's there! I'll get there one day, and it's going to be awesome. This has some really great potential.The flip mode works great, and is a lot of fun to toy around with. Pairing the quad with the Tx is very easy, but setting the control response and calibrating the sensors is a bit trickier (much easier on the Hubsan). Be sure to download and print the manual, and keep it stashed in the box when you take it somewhere. Incidentally, the box it comes in doubles as a decent carry case. When it inevitably starts to wear out, I'll start looking for a more durable case.I started flying in my living room, and then in my backyard. I was "okay" but kept crashing, of course. There are no prop guards for the Ominus, and it's fairly large and those blades pack a wallop. For beginners, I'd definitely recommend going out and finding a large open field to learn in. An unused baseball field is pretty good. My city park has a very large circular field that is bordered by tall trees, and it's pretty much perfect. The trees block the wind, and there are almost no obstacles. This was when I really started learning how to fly, since in the house and even my backyard I was so worked up about avoiding obstacles that I couldn't really concentrate on actually flying and seeing how to control it. After one day flying in a field, I was much better prepared to fly in more close confines. A new pilot will find that panic and overcorrection are their two worst enemies, and flying in an open field mostly removes these. Just make sure to practice when there is no one around that you could crash into.My one concern with the design of this quad is the design of the motor housings. The motors double as landing gear, and have little rubber feet in the bottoms of their housings. The housing is held in by a tiny screw opposite a larger plastic snap-in tab. That's all well and good, but if you hit the ground with a lot of lateral speed, especially moving in a diagonal direction, that tab isn't going to hold. The housing is then held in at an angle by that tiny screw, and the motor's gear won't interface properly with the prop gear. I bent it up pretty good once or twice, and once even had to undo that screw to get everything bent back into shape. Now that I'm flying better, this isn't as much of a concern, but I still wish the motor housings had some sort of brace that ran back to the center of the quad.Now I'm tinkering with the idea of mounting a camera to the Ominus for a bit of aerial photography. I bought the 808 #16 keychain camera, which is the lightest and cheapest of the cameras I've seen so far. It only weighs 19g, but is still apparently enough to throw the flight controller off. I'm sure the Ominus can handle the weight, but I think the balance might be off. The extra weight slung beneath it throws off the reponse quite a bit. When you move the stick back from forward flight, the Ominus overcorrects on its own and actually starts to fly slightly backwards for a second or two. Then the flight controller must decide that something's wrong, and responsiveness goes way down and it's hard to keep in the air. The camera runs off a 3.7v lipo cell just like the Ominus's cell but smaller, so I'm considering stripping it out of the case, removing the battery, and mounting it under the Ominus's canopy. There seems to be enough room in there. I can also probably find somewhere to connect it to power. I'm just not sure yet that I want to carve up the canopy so I can manipulate the controls. The good news is, if I mess it up , there are plenty of replacement parts available.I'm not sure why this never showed up in my initial searches here on Amazon, but I'm so glad I stumbled on it. Get one! You'll love it. (Oh, look at that, I meant to write a short review, and absolutely failed. D'oh!)

I buy a lot of drones that cost under $100. This one works fine out of the box its not a bad drone but in my opinion its a little over priced.most of the parts are cheap the blades are not bad there just Cheap. the Body they say is really durable but when I hold it in my hand and bend it I can feel its weaknesses & my first thought is Cheap. I have a lot of experience Flaying Drone so mine is fine I haven't even crashed it yet & I been using it for a couple days. the props are run by a gear system not directly by the motor this makes a lot of nose and is just another piece that can break or have problems. All & All its Ok But cheap parts an inexperienced flyer will break this drone in a couple days.

Update 1/1/15: Apparently the "secret code" I shared helped bring other dead copters back to life. Here it is in easier to follow format for those still suffering from this problem. The exact transcript from the manufacturer is below in my 12/22 update.1. Hold in the right stick and press the left stick in 4 times.2. Push the throttle trim all the way up and wait for the rear red LED to flash quickly.3. Press in the left stick to save it and then bring the throttle trim back to center.Also updated to 4 stars. It is a 5 star flyer -1 for my trouble.------------------------------Update 12/22/14: I returned the copter after replacing the control board (At my expense) and they sent it back in flying shape with this note in the box:"We calibrated the new control board you installed to your transmitter. We did this by holding in the right stick and press the left stick in 4 times. Next push the throttle trim all the way up and wait for the rear red LED to flash quickly. Then press in the left stick to save it and then bring the throttle trim back to center."It sounds like instructions to Street Fighter secret moves. But it flies now.I took it to an open field yesterday and let'er rip. This thing really flies when it flies at all.------------------------------Update 11/20/14: I contacted support from the manufacturer by email and they responded in one day with "It sounds like a faulty control board" and notified me that "I have replaced your control board for you. It should arrive in 3 - 10 business days." I will update this review when the part arrives with the results.----------------------------I flew it twice and now it will not start. I am hoping someone else has this problem and (Hopefully) knows how to fix it. I already contacted support and am waiting for a response. Here is what happened.After flying for the 2nd time I charged the battery and put it back in for a 3rd flight. The lights came on, and the LED started the fast blink when I powered up the remote, as it is supposed to, but the motor will not turn. It just sits on the floor with all the lights working. I changed the batteries in the remote, disconnected/reconnected charged battery, nothing seems to work.I wonder if the motor already burned out after flying twice. That would explain the symptoms. But the last flight concluded with a safe powered landing. It seems like if the motor were to fail it would happen mid-flight.If this thing would fly again it would deserve more stars. It really is fun to fly.Hopefully I will update this review with news of being airborne again.

I have had and do have quite a few 'drone'. Both inexpensive and high end DJI rigs. Though flying the Dromidia is quite fun, it is also prone to failure. My last one just started flying erratically and had to be thrown away. This was my forth and last Dromidia.