Solo Bricked. Getting really sick of 3DR support's delays.

[Pedals2Paddles]

They want everything because they ship you back a complete package (solo, battery, charger, controller, etc). In my experience, they have you keep the gimbal.

Use the chat. It is way faster than the email.

 

[pyrate]

many members here will downplay/turn a blind eye to Solo's shortcomings.

that said my experience with the support has been terrific. Same with their development team. The way the product launched was quite terrible and I was/am quite vocal about it but all in all they're doing a decent job in my own experiences.

Good luck with your issues. Hope it turns out favorably..we could always use more Solo advocates.

I do not think that is the case, been called a fanboy many times pffffft Not at all unaware of the short comings, but I am not a drama king. The problems with solo compared to others is really minimal, and when you do have a real problem no one steps up like 3DR. But as someone who works in the consumer goods service industry I can tell you. If you come at one of my people with a bad attitude, you will not be treated as well as someone who partners solving the problem.
That is just a fact that humans get more done working together than dealing with someone who feels entitled.

I crack up at the ones who say, I have a shoot this weekend and my solo is broke. What are you shooting exactly? If you are using solo in a business you are smart enough to have backups. If not you are just on here pretending to be a professional.

 

[Doug Gann]

They want everything because they ship you back a complete package (solo, battery, charger, controller, etc). In my experience, they have you keep the gimbal.

Use the chat. It is way faster than the email.

I thought my problem was a broken controller and gimbal, and suggested simply returning the controller and gimbal, as the solo itself flies perfectly. I was reminded that the quad and controller are tested as a linked pair.

As for Chat, that's where I started.

 

[Burkeam]

I kindly ask them to escalate and offer a CC for advance replacement. I don't think it is standard OP for them but I had my new Solo by the end of the week and the hold on my CC was released the following Thursday after receiving my return.

As far as support we went back and forth a few time to clarify the facts around my incident and interrupt the flight logs. Once they determined to replace I had my new solo in two day. This is excellent customer service.

I'm glad to see they are taking care of you. Wait until the RTF DJI fellows contact customer support, you will look very wise at that point.

 

[Doug Gann]

That's great advice, if I had only known to do this.

Once I get my replacement, can I hit you up for further advice on the MAPIR infrared?

 

[Burkeam]

Sure. I just realized I don't know how to spell

 

[Bigskyflyer]

I kindly ask them to escalate and offer a CC for advance replacement. I don't think it is standard OP for them but I had my new Solo by the end of the week and the hold on my CC was released the following Thursday after receiving my return.

As far as support we went back and forth a few time to clarify the facts around my incident and interrupt the flight logs. Once they determined to replace I had my new solo in two day. This is excellent customer service.

I'm glad to see they are taking care of you. Wait until the RTF DJI fellows contact customer support, you will look very wise at that point.

Burkeam, I think DJI is starting to see the error of their ways and are starting to step up their customer service. Fortunately, I haven't had any issues with my P3 in the year that I have had it. I guess when you own the market you think you can get away with crappy service but sooner or later you have to come around. The only issue I have had was a defective battery and DJI had me 2 new batteries in eight days with a note apologizing for any inconvenience the defective battery may have caused. I'm not sure what you mean by RTF DJI guy's, but I am guessing you mean ready to fly. I believe that the solo is also advertised as RTF. Myself and probably many out there don't have time to constantly be tinkering with this cable and this plug and GPS issues. I sold my solo some time back to a friend and to this day I am usually thru half a battery on my P3 before the solo ever leaves the ground. I will say this, he likes the solo just fine. He has more time to tinker than I do. I just charge my batteries and go fly, I have never had to touch anything on the P3, I just go fly and take good videos and pictures and above all have fun. In the end that is what it's all about. To me, this is just a hobby, I don't use mine professionally, I just don't have the time to tinker.

 

[Burkeam]

Burkeam, I think DJI is starting to see the error of their ways and are starting to step up their customer service. Fortunately, I haven't had any issues with my P3 in the year that I have had it. I guess when you own the market you think you can get away with crappy service but sooner or later you have to come around. The only issue I have had was a defective battery and DJI had me 2 new batteries in eight days with a note apologizing for any inconvenience the defective battery may have caused. I'm not sure what you mean by RTF DJI guy's, but I am guessing you mean ready to fly. I believe that the solo is also advertised as RTF. Myself and probably many out there don't have time to constantly be tinkering with this cable and this plug and GPS issues. I sold my solo some time back to a friend and to this day I am usually thru half a battery on my P3 before the solo ever leaves the ground. I will say this, he likes the solo just fine. He has more time to tinker than I do. I just charge my batteries and go fly, I have never had to touch anything on the P3, I just go fly and take good videos and pictures and above all have fun. In the end that is what it's all about. To me, this is just a hobby, I don't use mine professionally, I just don't have the time to tinker.

I'm glad DJI id stepping up so other don't have to deal with the disappointment I went through.

I hear where you coming from however I'm a maker and a hacker. Just having the possibility to hack and maintain my sUAV, independently of the manufacturer's network is a extremely big issues for me. This is also why I don't own Apple products.

Not understanding other delays to start. I have no reasons why I can't be airborne in less than two minutes except I follow a checklist and 80% of the time am connecting to my PC and preparing for missions.

 

[Satmandanny]

Trouble free

So I've had a problem out of the box, my controller will not shut down after an update the "device updated" check mark is displayed. Chatted with tech support, they said not to worry, if the controller has not shut it self off or left the update completed screen half for half an hour, to simply power cycle the controller.

Since then its the same story after every update. Annoying but no big deal. Except that some odd, non-repeatable bugs started happening on each and every flight. Go pro acting like it was collecting images, but not really. Controller screen failing mid-flight etc etc. After 20 flights where something has gone wrong out of 24 total flights, I'm amazed that I've not suffered at total system failure and crashed.

So, after total gimbal failure 8 times in a row I wrote to tech support in Late April. Sent logs and video samples of the problem. They asked me to rewire the gimbal and try again, promising to replace the gimbal if it failed again. 2 weeks of strong winds kept me grounded, but when I did fly, the gimbal failed again. 3DR demanded I do yet another set of tests, this time the gimbal is making a high pitch whining sound, cannot pitch lower than 80 degrees and is so hot the Gopro fails completely.

So I try a factory reset, and the device is now bricked. The first update after the reset crashes the controller, and the Solo refuses to pair. I reported this to 3DR along with all of my steps to try and correct the problem on May 9th. Contacted by 3DR support 4 days later telling me I need to send them some videos of my problem, before they would replace the Gimbal. I responded on the 9th that perhaps they should actually read customer emails before responding to existing issues.

So a week later, I still have a brick. I'm supposed to make this drone available to students in a week's time, and I have a brick. I've spent more in wages on endless updates / factory reset cycles than our non profit has spent on the Solo itself. All of my colleagues who ignored my warnings about DJI (see Flight of the Phantom) are out with their Phantom 4's, trouble free. I have a brick.

Trouble free P4s are only the beginning of the benefits. Good luck.

 

[Bigskyflyer]

I'm glad DJI id stepping up so other don't have to deal with the disappointment I went through.

I hear where you coming from however I'm a maker and a hacker. Just having the possibility to hack and maintain my sUAV, independently of the manufacturer's network is a extremely big issues for me. This is also why I don't own Apple products.

Not understanding other delays to start. I have no reasons why I can't be airborne in less than two minutes except I follow a checklist and 80% of the time am connecting to my PC and preparing for missions.

Mostly it is GPS and I think it is more to do with where we fly. We take them camping in the mountains so there is a lot of trees and hills around. He just takes off in fly manual and takes it up high enough until he gets GPS lock. I think having glonas and lightbridge also helps greatly in these conditions because he loses GPS and controller connection often. We notice when we are flying close to the trees his GPS count drops to five or six where typically I am at twelve or thirteen. Just the nature of the beast I guess. He doesn't seem to mind, he just deals with it. We have a blast out flying like this and neither of us has had a catastrophic failure yet, finger's crossed.

 

[Satmandanny]

I got great supoort from everyone at 3DR. Toured the return repair warehouse in San Diego. Great people. Very friendly Latinos. Unfortunately Due to multiple failures as a result of what seemed to be horrible quality control and using low grade electronic measuring components the iris+ and several Solo prove to me to be very unreliable. And reliability is what we are all after.
After finally getting the long waited over promised gimbal it ended up also having issues. I was on my third when 3DR close customer phone support and the writing was on the wall. At least for me it was.

You are right. Unless this is the 3DR Good News Forum I'm can promise you, when Cust support deteriorated to texting and e-mailing I finally went to Phantom-IV. I really don't want to over amp the P4 but let's just say I can tell in the forum who has actually owned one and who are lying about even seeing one. Because if your are any kind of experienced dronie and have not flown the new P4 and finally get the opportunity to give one a work out you will immediately understand what all the hype is about.
And Umm, No.... I'm not Trolling. Just in case there is a dumb Ignorant comment about me being a Troll or DJI secret infiltration agent or spy. If 3DR gets with program and goes back to offering support I will revisit them. But from what I hear... I'm kind of doubt it.
Good luck. You migh t try eBay. It worked for me. Just before the news got out and the Solo price went yesteryear I lucked out and found mine a new home.
There is new tech coming out every six months. Solo is almost a year and a half old, with not one cool upgrade platform add-on as over promised. Just firmware fixes and application updates in effort to finally have a working product that can still hardly fly under a tree or coverage. No sonar no optics. Nothing. But a fantastic drone for 2013. Back when someone answered the phone in TJ.

 

[Burkeam]

I got great supoort from everyone at 3DR. Toured the return repair warehouse in San Diego. Great people. Very friendly Latinos. Unfortunately Due to multiple failures as a result of what seemed to be horrible quality control and using low grade electronic measuring components the iris+ and several Solo prove to me to be very unreliable. And reliability is what we are all after.
After finally getting the long waited over promised gimbal it ended up also having issues. I was on my third when 3DR close customer phone support and the writing was on the wall. At least for me it was.

You are right. Unless this is the 3DR Good News Forum I'm can promise you, when Cust support deteriorated to texting and e-mailing I finally went to Phantom-IV. I really don't want to over amp the P4 but let's just say I can tell in the forum who has actually owned one and who are lying about even seeing one. Because if your are any kind of experienced dronie and have not flown the new P4 and finally get the opportunity to give one a work out you will immediately understand what all the hype is about.
And Umm, No.... I'm not Trolling. Just in case there is a dumb Ignorant comment about me being a Troll or DJI secret infiltration agent or spy. If 3DR gets with program and goes back to offering support I will revisit them. But from what I hear... I'm kind of doubt it.
Good luck. You migh t try eBay. It worked for me. Just before the news got out and the Solo price went yesteryear I lucked out and found mine a new home.
There is new tech coming out every six months. Solo is almost a year and a half old, with not one cool upgrade platform add-on as over promised. Just firmware fixes and application updates in effort to finally have a working product that can still hardly fly under a tree or coverage. No sonar no optics. Nothing. But a fantastic drone for 2013. Back when someone answered the phone in TJ.

I will be building from scratch or buying one with a Pix4 long before trying the hyped P4 or any other DJI product. Their approach does not align my my business values. My experience is the cost of ownership of the Solo is much better while enabling me to punch my envelope of on-board technologies. The price drop means I buy more. The lack of phone support suck but it was also a huge inefficient operating cost. I'm sure the off the phone support has increased tickets per tech 150% if not more. It's a step backward but still very effective.

Aftermarket motor pod on the Solo would be great. Maybe this opinion if formed due to the mentioned QC perception.
In the end let's talk if and when the P4 fails and how much it cost you in $ and time.

Maybe I'm just suborn, ignorant and too happy with the Solo - at least for today..

 

[Bigskyflyer]

I will be building from scratch or buying one with a Pix4 long before trying the hyped P4 or any other DJI product. Their approach does not align my my business values. My experience is the cost of ownership of the Solo is much better while enabling me to punch my envelope of on-board technologies. The price drop means I buy more. The lack of phone support suck but it was also a huge inefficient operating cost. I'm sure the off the phone support has increased tickets per tech 150% if not more. It's a step backward but still very effective.

Aftermarket motor pod on the Solo would be great. Maybe this opinion if formed due to the mentioned QC perception.
In the end let's talk if and when the P4 fails and how much it cost you in $ and time.

Maybe I'm just suborn, ignorant and too happy with the Solo - at least for today..

I don't think you're stubborn or ignorant, you are speaking from your experience. You had a bad experience with dji's product and support. I, on the other hand, had a poor experience with the solo that all the great customer service in the world wasn't going to overcome. Maybe I am stubborn and ignorant. The solo, for me anyway, has not lived up to all the hype. The poor launch and unreliability of the solo, at first, was more than I wanted to deal with at the time. Do I regret my decision? Not yet, but maybe down the road I will. We'll see.

 

[PdxSteve]

That's very strange that a product reduces its price 6 months to a year after being out in the market. That just never happens with consumer goods.

 

[Burkeam]

I don't think you're stubborn or ignorant, you are speaking from your experience. You had a bad experience with dji's product and support. I, on the other hand, had a poor experience with the solo that all the great customer service in the world wasn't going to overcome. Maybe I am stubborn and ignorant. The solo, for me anyway, has not lived up to all the hype. The poor launch and unreliability of the solo, at first, was more than I wanted to deal with at the time. Do I regret my decision? Not yet, but maybe down the road I will. We'll see.

I was fortunate to jump on the Solo brand July 2015 and still got the 1st shipment of gimbals so I missed the previous months growing pains. I like some of DJI platforms offering but really need to keep with the Pix4 platform

I don't think you're stubborn or ignorant, you are speaking from your experience. You had a bad experience with dji's product and support. I, on the other hand, had a poor experience with the solo that all the great customer service in the world wasn't going to overcome. Maybe I am stubborn and ignorant. The solo, for me anyway, has not lived up to all the hype. The poor launch and unreliability of the solo, at first, was more than I wanted to deal with at the time. Do I regret my decision? Not yet, but maybe down the road I will. We'll see.

Hear you. I was lucky to get in after the launch. I bought the Solo on July 15 and still got the 1st batch of Gimbals. I was able to miss the earlier frustrations and delays.

 

[Bigskyflyer]

I was fortunate to jump on the Solo brand July 2015 and still got the 1st shipment of gimbals so I missed the previous months growing pains. I like some of DJI platforms offering but really need to keep with the Pix4 platform

Hear you. I was lucky to get in after the launch. I bought the Solo on July 15 and still got the 1st batch of Gimbals. I was able to miss the earlier frustrations and delays.

I was kinda hoping that 3DR would have come out with some hardware improvements by now, like dual satellite capability, something similar to lightbridge but better, object avoidance, the capability to take off from a boat and maybe some better quality motors. Instead it looks like they are stepping away from the solo, other than an occasional firmware upgrade. Hopefully they will integrate some of the new stuff they are working on into the solo. I guess we will wait and see what happens. I also think they shot themselves in the foot by aiming this thing at the hobbyists, solo is a little too complicated for the average hobbyist to grasp.

 

[Burkeam]

I was kinda hoping that 3DR would have come out with some hardware improvements by now, like dual satellite capability, something similar to lightbridge but better, object avoidance, the capability to take off from a boat and maybe some better quality motors. Instead it looks like they are stepping away from the solo, other than an occasional firmware upgrade. Hopefully they will integrate some of the new stuff they are working on into the solo. I guess we will wait and see what happens.

Well I'm optimistic the Solo has a lot of room to evolve before becoming obsolete. I'm really anxious to learn more about the tether. We will start to see a whole new headline of drones bothering the neighbors. "What -I'm just cooling my roof down"

 

[franknitty69]

...
Just firmware fixes and application updates in effort to finally have a working product that can still hardly fly under a tree or coverage
...

just some firmware fixes and application updates? so i guess multipoint cable cam, free look, plan your flight, altitude aware follow me, leash, zipline, pano, augmented reality, geofence, rewind and ekf2 are just some firmware fixes and application updates.

 

[Bigskyflyer]

just some firmware fixes and application updates? so i guess multipoint cable cam, free look, plan your flight, altitude aware follow me, leash, zipline, pano, augmented reality, geofence, rewind and ekf2 are just some firmware fixes and application updates.

All of that doesn't mean much without decent hardware. Less than stellar satellite reception, Wi Fi connectivity and motors that can't take a minor crash or flip in the grass without burning up are just a few of the hardware short comings. Not slamming the solo but I thought by now they would have updated some hardware. They are getting way behind the curve when it comes to the hardware their competition is coming out with.

 

[Burkeam]

All of that doesn't mean much without decent hardware. Less than stellar satellite reception, Wi Fi connectivity and motors that can't take a minor crash or flip in the grass without burning up are just a few of the hardware short comings. Not slamming the solo but I thought by now they would have updated some hardware. They are getting way behind the curve when it comes to the hardware their competition is coming out with.

I have wish this too however I'm no Chris Anderson so I'll have to wait on others to do it for me. I'm just thinking he knows what he is doing. It's hard for me to judge when I don't know whats going on behind the scenes. They are in the middle of a very exciting and disturbing technology where business models are in a continual flux. In the end 3DR has delivered me an experience better then any amusement park. I have been thrilled to dive back into making and hacking with the passion while knowing it will be paying my bills in the near future. I see 3DR as a descent shirt tail to ride until the view needs to change. Like carrying 3 cameras and a 30+ min flight time. I just can't buy a Apple product nor DJI. It's just to painful to let go of being in control. lol