Since the AA300 is labeled as a GPS drone, it’s important to highlight all of the flight modes that this technology unlocks for users. These features include return-to-home, one-touch takeoff and landing, and follow-me mode.
If you’ve never flown a drone before, you’re probably wondering what all those modes do and what they mean. Return-to-home will bring your drone back at the push of a button as well as if the battery is running low, or your drone loses it’s GPS connection.
One-touch takeoff and landing can be helpful to new pilots because they can easily launch and land their drone using a button on their transmitter.
Finally, I was really excited to take a look at the follow-me functions. Unfortunately, I found it kind of clunky. The drone locks on the signal coming from your smartphone and is a somewhat jerky. The feature will take some getting used to.
These are all great features included with the AA300, and for the most part they work surprisingly well for a drone at this point. However, I’d still caution you from flying this drone in moderately high winds (over 10-15 mph). Because the AA300 is so light, you could lose control of the aircraft.
1080p Camera
When you buy a drone under $200, you can expect it to include some kind of camera. Most drones in this price range aren’t the best quality but are still great for learning the basics of drone photography.
With the AA300, pilots are able to experience a high-quality 1080p HD camera. It’s great if you have an interest in aerial photography and videography and want to try your hand at it. Pilots can also connect their smartphone to the remote control transmitter and use the WiFi capabilities to transmit footage for FPV flying.
Battery Life
You can fly the AA300 for about 15 minutes before needing to recharge the battery. As mentioned, the AA300 only comes with one battery. New pilots will enjoy this somewhat short battery life for a while as they learn all of the drone’s features and flight modes. I’d recommend picking up an additional battery or two just so you can dedicate at least a half hour to each flying session.
Flight Performance
Overall, I was pretty impressed with the flight performance of the AA300 drone. The drone responds like you would expect from the controls and I found that I never really approached the 150 meter range that Altair touts. For a drone this small and light, I felt more comfortable at a little over 100 meters and the drone did excellent at that distance.
The GPS technology and multiple flight modes help users stay in control of their drone at all times. My favorite feature was the return to home function. With one touch I was able to bring the drone back to its origin point. That comes in handy with a drone of this size. In fact, I used this on my first flight when I was testing the range. Once the drone got far enough away that it was difficult to orient myself, I simply used the return to home function and the drone came right back to where it took off. This feature is in a lot of GPS drones, but I felt like it was a valuable feature for this drone especially.
