Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

EDIT: Reduced to 2 stars, see below. This is one of a growing number of low-ish cost, micro-sized (about 7" diameter) quad-copters that are available from various Asian manufacturers. Holy Stone, for what it's worth, seems to be one of the more reputable of these many resellers. I've flown a number of these small quads and this one seems to rank on the higher-end in terms of quality. The whole thing is assembled using very small phillips screws, instead of plastic rivets, which is nice from a repairability standpoint. The controller has three rates, none of which affect yaw, but should provide a nice spread of easy-handling and high-maneuverability. At the lowest rate, the quad can be easily controlled indoors, and at the medium and highest rates, the quad performs well outside. The battery last for a solid 7 minute flight on a full charge, but seems to take unusually long to charge off the included USB charger - over an hour. The quad's control board appears to have some kind of battery-drain protection built in. As you reach empty, the LEDs will start to blink and it will refuse to take throttle. This is a bit odd at first, but actually lets you come to a stop gracefully (sorta.) Headless mode (relative orientation control) is a feature on this, but never worked correctly for me. The Engrish manual isn't really all that great, but I've flown enough of these to be sure I was enabling it correctly. I've deducted half a star for this. The controller is very odd. It's rather large, bulky, and uncomfortable to hold. The beeps it emanated when making adjustments or using "headless" mode are also obnoxious. Half a star off. There are two very irritating design flaws in this quad that reduce it's review from 4 to 3 stars. The first are the feet. They are sort of springy. Which seems nice, except it means that any time the quad is landed with even a small amount of force, it bounces and flips over onto it's top. Get's annoying after the nth time. The second flaw is in the top prop guards. They don't extend far enough UP past the top of the props. If you bonk this into a ceiling, the tops of the props with the ceiling and drive the prop body down into the drone body on the motor shaft, jamming the prop. You've then got to get out a knife and pry the prop up on the shaft. Overall, this is a decent, well built, well handling entry into the bargain micro-quad field. Though at this price point ($45 at time of writing), it's design flaws and lack of an on board camera (like the similarly sized-and-priced Syma X11C) prevent it from getting my recommendation. If you're in the market for a micro quad, look at the Syma X11 and save a few bucks. EDIT: A few new quirks have shown up that have reduced this to a 2/5: 1: It seems to dislike batteries other than it's own. I've gotten a few matching batteries for this but they seem to only work intermittently (while they work great in my other micro quads). Sometimes they work (probably 1/4 tries), but other times the quad will just sit there and blink and refuse to run. 2: The accelerometers seem to be failing/degrading. The quad now needs to have it's accl recentered on a flat surface after every take off and landing. If this isn't done, it will either immediately flip over upon take off, or list powerfully to one side. Stay away from this one until Holy Stone gets the bugs squashed and go with one of the competitors.