The new DJI Inpire 1 quadcopter drone review (with interview)

The DJI Phantom made a big splash of things in the pool of quadcopters over the last few years, allowing it to take its place near the top. This year, however, they have a lot of strong competition coming their way thanks to companies like Hexo+, but they aren’t stepping back just yet. Towards the end of last year, they launched their new Inspire 1 drone to 1-up their Phantom series.

The new Inspire 1 offers an upgrade on all angles including:

• 360-degree gimble with arms that lift the feet away giving you a clear view.
• 4K video and image recording.
• Enhanced GPS giving you a much stronger lock with an average of up to 18 satellites.
• The ability to fly without the need for GPS and still be able to hover in place and know its height from the ground.
• The ability to use two controllers so that the drone and camera can be controlled separately, allowing the pilot to focus solely on flying.
• Modular design allowing you to remove the camera and gimble for travel or even upgrade it (this is important). – We have a Phantom Vision 2+ here at the office, and the only thing we regret about it, is the fact that we can’t upgrade the camera to something better. This limits our use of it and the lifespan of the entire unit.
• Lightbridge system allowing you to maintain live HD video at more than a mile’s distance.
• Auto take-off and landing.
• Up to 18 minutes of flight time.

This is by far, the best product that DJI has developed. Answering most, if not all, the issues Phantom owners brought to their attention in the past.

Just like the Phantom, it is easy to fly. This doesn’t mean that anyone can grab that controller and have a go at it, but it does mean that if you have flown a quad before, you are more than likely going to be natural at this one. The controls are smooth and each movement is predictable to your expectations.

We have mentioned a fun comparison in the past by pointing out to gamers, that if you can drive a “Warthog” or “Banshee” in the game “Halo” (in a high-stress situation at fast speeds) and survive with minimal damage to your vehicle (or without flying off the ledge of a cliff)…you can pilot a DJI quadcopter. The Inspire 1 feels no different to this theory. Members of our office, with no RC experience at all, have flown our Phantom 2 Vision+ without any troubles (taking to it within the first few minutes of flight).

Inspire 1’s ability to lock onto the ground to determine its height and position is amazing. So accurate, you can fly it indoors without (as much) fear. No more having to worry about a GPS lock-on, this allows you to take the drone to additional places that you couldn’t before (without having to place an increased amount of effort into controlling it and a decreased chance of smooth video). Now it can smoothly capture its video just about anywhere.

The 4K camera is also a major player in this, as the resolution and frame rate is obviously much better than that of the Vision 2+. If you are looking for a solid 1080 video, then capture it at 4K and compress it down. Both in video and photography, we always recommend shooting at a higher resolution than you plan to deliver. The end result almost always comes out looking a little better. The gimbal also feels a bit smoother than the Phantom’s. Maybe this is because we have crashed our Phantom a few times during various benchmarks…

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The modular capability of both the camera and gimbal happens to be one of our favorite highlights. As mentioned above, we cannot replace the camera on our Phantom without making major modifications. Even if we went that far, we would be switching to a GoPro mount/gimbal (which is actually better anyway, but also really expensive) vs upgrading to the next-gen DJI camera. For example, the Inspire 1 camera is not compatible with the Phantom as it maintains proprietary connections and on-board firmware. With the Inspire 1, you will be able to swap the camera with whatever they come out with next (assuming the next model they release continues down that path, and they don’t change their mind about supporting the Inspire 1).

Sadly, we weren’t able to demo nor observe the option of connecting two controllers to control the camera and drone apart from each other. We find this to be a fun feature as any drone lover will tell you that it’s not easy to babysit both the flight of the drone AND the angle of the camera at the same time. Giving the responsibility to someone else is always more successful in obtaining a better shot. However, previously when you did that, you also lose the view for yourself so you are essentially flying by line-of-sight, while whoever has the cellphone or tablet has FPV of the camera. Now, both individuals can have their own controller AND have a downlink with what the camera is seeing. This way the pilot can see more than just line-of-sight, and still not have to worry about messing with the camera angle or settings. Superb.

Speed and handling is great. Like the Phantom, it can take off and soar through the sky. It also handles the wind very well. We couldn’t benchmark it on speed so much since we were limited in our trials, but it did feel fast than the Phantom and there was a bit of wind a few hundred feet up and it didn’t seem to bother it much at all.

The design of the Inspire 1 is also impressive. Like Parrot, they decided to go with something unique vs the same design everyone else in the quadcopter market has molded theirs to look like. The Inspire 1 instead looks like something out of Terminator. Now, all it needs is the abilities of the Hexo+ and you will truly have your own Skynet Drone.

You can watch our interview with drone expert Randy Jay Braun with DJI here:

Our Conclusion

Once again, the Inspire 1 is the best drone that DJI has launched. Both look and function, it is unique to the drone market, giving it an edge against everything else. DJI is known for pushing its products further than some of the competing companies, allowing you to get more for your money. It is by far, feature-strong, making it a solid tool for professional drone lovers around the world (as well as hobbyists alike). The only draw-back is the price. Launching at $2899, it is not for weak at heart. It is going to cost you a lot of money to invest in one of these, so make sure that you know what you are doing before you launch it. The last thing you need is to send $3000 right into a wall somewhere. Price weighs heavy in our rating of it since this year does give way to a lot of fierce competition. We decided to go with an 8 out of 10. This will be one of the dominating drones this year, but companies like Hexo+ are hard on its tail to change that. Despite that, do we want an Inspire 1 here at the office? Yes! It won enough attention here to gain win the Editors’ Choice award even.

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*Updated: Included a few more highlighted points as well as a direct link to the item on DJI’s website.

Are you a manufacturer or distributor that would like us to test something out for review? Contact us and we can let you know where to send the product and we will try it out.