Holy Stone HS710 Short Review
The Holy Stone HS710 is a good GPS enabled drone that comes with an HD camera that can record videos in 4k and capture images in 4k as well. The drone is equipped with brushless motors, intelligent flight modes, automatic return to home feature and comes with an optical flow sensor that will allow you to fly indoors. The drone has a good flight time and has a control range of around 600 meters.
Key Features
- HD camera
- 110° FOV
- Records videos in 4k & 2.5k
- 4k images
- Intelligent flight modes
- Dual GNSS receiver
- Automatic return to home
- 23 minutes of flight time
- 600-meter range
Hi and welcome to this review of the Holy Stone HS710 drone, a new drone from Holy Stone and one that comes with some good features.
Holy Stone are a well-established drone company that specialises in low to mid-tier drones. Some of their popular drones include the HS720E, HS700E and HS175D.
Most Holy Stone drones are suitable for beginners as they are easy to operate, and this includes the Holy Stone HS710.
Holy Stone HS710 Review
This is a nice looking drone that has a foldable design and is very lightweight, the drone weighs less than 250 grams, which means that if you live in the USA, you will not need to register the drone with the FAA.
However, for UK residents, you will need to obtain an Operator ID from the CAA and make sure that the drone is clearly labelled with this ID.
The drone has an all-black colour scheme, and the main body looks like a mini version of the DJI FPV drone.
It comes with brushless motors which helps with better flight stabilisation and has LED lights on the end of each rotor. These lights look cool and also help to indicate when the drone has been fully calibrated.
The drone comes with a dual GNSS module that will allow it to connect with the GPS and GLONASS satellite systems and also has an optical flow sensor on the bottom to help with flight stabilisation when there is no GPS signal.
The optical flow sensor also allows you to operate the drone indoors as well.
There is a micro SD card slot on the bottom of the drone, the maximum capacity it can handle is 32GB. It’s advised that you purchase a memory card of class 10 or above for the best results when recording HD videos and capturing HD images.
The drone is powered by an intelligent lithium polymer battery, it’s a small battery that provides around 18 minutes of flight time.
Although the official stated flight time is 23 minutes, this figure is sometimes exaggerated by many drone companies and usually, the flight time is way less.
As an added bonus, Holy Stone does provide an extra battery, so you can extend the flight time without having to wait for the battery to recharge, which can take a few hours.
The battery has LED lights on the back to indicate its power level and you can charge it via a USB cable.
The controller for the drone is the same as many other Holy Stone drones, it’s small and has a smartphone attachment that pulls out from the top.
A good feature of this controller is the large LCD screen in the middle that displays telemetry data about the drone.
With a quick glance, you can see the drones flight status, GPS signal strength, battery level and height and distance information.
There are two handles that pull out from the bottom that provides a better grip and the controller is powered by 2 AA batteries which are not included with the drone package, which is unfortunate.
To use the drone FPV and autonomous flight modes feature, you will need to download the Ophelia GO app which is available for both Android and iOS devices. However, this app only works with iOS 9.0 (or above) and Android 5.0 (or above).
Holy Stone HS710 Camera
The camera for the Holy Stone HS710 is good but I have seen better drones at a similar or cheaper price range.
The camera has 110° FOV and the lens can be remotely adjusted to 90° to get better viewing angles.
It can record videos in 2.5k at 60fps and 4k at 30fps, although judging from the quality of the 4k footage, I suspect the resolution is interpolated.
Both the 4k and 2k resolution can only be recorded on a memory card, otherwise, videos will be recorded in HD over WiFi on your smartphone and the quality isn’t always good.
Images are captured in 4k (on a memory card) or HD on your smartphone.
As the camera has no stabilisation feature, you will notice a lot of shakiness and distortion in the videos.
The quality is decent but as I stated, there are better options and one of the best is the DJI Mini SE, which is a little more expensive, but the overall quality of the camera is far superior and worth the extra you would pay.
Flight Features & Performance
The drone comes with a few cool features that will make flying it more enjoyable.
Of course, there is there FPV feature, you can stream live video footage from a maximum range of around300 meters and as long as the weather is good and you do not fly in windy conditions, the video quality is good.
The drone has 2-speed modes and comes with 3 intelligent flight modes that require a strong GPS signal to work properly.
These flight modes include, follow me, point of interest and tapfly.
The drone also comes with an automatic return to home feature, this is activated whenever the drone battery gets low on power or if it loses connection with the controller.
This feature can also be activated manually via the remote controller or the app.
Overall, the drone performs well, most of the features work as they should, although there have been complaints about the intelligent flight modes not always operating correctly.
The drone is easy to fly and hovers well, as it is a small and lightweight drone, it should not be flown in any kind of windy conditions, especially if you are a beginner.
Final Thoughts
This drone costs just under $300, so it’s one of Holy Stones more expensive drones and it is a fun drone to fly, however at the price it’s currently selling for, there are some good alternatives around the same price range.
One of these is the new DJI Mini SE, which I believe is superior, especially its camera and would definitely recommend it over any other drone in this price range.
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