TL;DR — I am enjoying flying the Potensic ATOM 2 drone. It is a mini drone and quite affordable. The upgraded PTD-1 controller is comfortable to use. The controls feel better, with the right blend of sensitivity and speed. I can see the screen in daylight. The ATOM-2 camera seems perfectly fine for my non-professional needs, with the gimbal and zoom managed with the controller during flight. Is it a tool? That’s what I tell myself. It is a very enjoyable tool to use!
I have some DJI-brand drones, but considering what is going on with foreign-made drones, I thought it prudent to try another brand. Granted, the Potensic ATOM 2 is also a foreign-made drone, but it’s not that company that some folks are so wound up about.
Does flying this mini drone intersect with amateur radio? Possibly, but the uses are limited:
- There’s no option to carry a payload with this little drone. You’re not going to use it to carry a messenger line or thin wire over a tree. But you can inspect a tree to see where you want to place a wire antenna, or to get a better idea why your wire is stuck in a tree.
- If you have an antenna mounted on the roof, it is far safer to use the drone to examine the mast and mount than it is to climb up on the roof, no matter how low and safe your roof is. I say this because a friend’s husband slipped on a ladder while pruning shrubs, and although he only fell a few feet, he broke several ribs, fractured several spinal processes, and punctured a lung. Ladders are dangerous. Consider using a drone (or invite your friend with a drone) to do an initial inspection of your antenna system.
I flew it for the first time a few days ago. I had heard the camera was poor but my first few photos look fine. Here’s one, an evening shot as the sun is dropping in the west, behind the Olympic Mountains in Washington State.
I opted for the PTD-1 controller. This has a large screen built-in, so no more fiddling with a phone app and some spring-loaded gizmo to hold the phone in place. No more having to connect my phone to the controller body with a cable. It’s very nice and I’m glad I chose this upgrade, but the battery life is not great. It’s rechargeable, so perhaps I can carry a small USB battery in my pocket and plug it in when I’m using the controller. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty of controller battery life for a couple of flights, but I thought it would be a bit better than what I am experiencing.
The ATOM 2 is small and light. The arms fold out from the side (no odd swiveling up and down like with the DJI Mini drones).
First flight? Easy peasy. The drone is automatically set to beginner mode which limits the height and speed at which you can fly. I lifted off vertically, slowly spun it in a 360-degree circle, then moved between some trees to take the “Olympics from Mason Lake” photo above.
The next day — after upgrading firmware (twice!), and updating flight safety data — I flew it again, taking a short video in which I panned the aircraft left-to-right, from the inlet-end of the lake to the end of our little cove. My DJI drones always felt like they panned too fast. It was really difficult for me to slow the pan enough to avoid a sense of motion sickness. The Potensic ATOM 2 can pan quickly, but if I gently pressed on the joystick, it panned at a very steady, sedate pace. Nice.
(Later, I noticed that photos are being saved to the drone’s microSD card in JPG and DNG format. What is DNG? Digital Negative. It’s a RAW file format that I probably don’t have much use for as a hobbyist, but my semi-pro brother would appreciate getting images in a RAW system.)
How to get out of beginner mode? This was not obvious. Finally, I discovered that if I slid my finger from the top of the controller screen downward, I could access settings. That was the key to get through this barrier. I set the max height at 120 meters and max distance 500 meters.
My overall impressions after a couple of flights? Positive, with these particular points:
- The ATOM 2 is a simple, very lightweight drone. Unfolding the legs is simpler than with the DJI Mini drone series.
- Battery life for the drone is adequate. We’d all like to have a battery that lasted an hour or more, but that’s not possible while keeping under the 249 gram weight limit for this drone class.
- I liked that a wide velcro strap came with the drone to help keep the legs and propellor blades folded against the body of the drone while in storage. That helps prevent damage.
- The controller was larger and heavier than I thought it would be, so I was especially glad that I bought the neck strap accessory. The plastic body of the controller feels a little bit slippery, so the neck strap helps me know I’m not going to drop it in the lake.
- The joystick controls are just the right blend of sensitivity and speed. Very small movements equate to small movements of the drone or camera. This is an area where I feel the Atom 2 wins over the DJI Mini.
- Having extra real estate with the built-in screen in the PTD-1 controller was a blessing. With my DJI drones, it always felt like the screen wasn’t big enough to see all the information I needed to safely operate. With the PTD-1’s larger screen, I can still see what the camera is seeing, and operating data is distributed around the periphery of the bright screen. Also, the screen is easier to see in daylight than my phone screen.
- The most difficult part of using the ATOM 2 was reading the serial number. It’s a tiny set of numbers and letters beside a very small QR code on the bottom of the drone. I had to put a second pair of reading glasses over my usual readers to magnify it enough to see clearly.
Since I had operated drones before, I spent very little time with the Potensic manual and tutorials. If you have more than 30 minutes of flying time in your pocket, I think you’ll find the Potensic ATOM 2 very easy and intuitive to fly.
Bottom line: I am enjoying flying the Potensic ATOM 2 more than the DJI Mini drones. The controller is more comfortable. The controls feel better, with the right blend of sensitivity and speed. I can see the screen in daylight. The camera seems perfectly fine for my non-professional needs. Is it a tool? That’s what I tell myself. It is a very enjoyable tool to use.
The price for this drone? The basic package is on a limited time deal now on Amazon for $289.99:
I opted for the Fly More Combo (and I upgraded the controller):
Learn more at https://www.potensic.com/atom-2-faq.html and with the manual at https://www.potensic.com/downloads.html.
NOTE: After publication, I found a chart that compares the ATOM 2 with the DJI MINI 4K. View it at https://fstoppers.com/reviews/potensic-atom-2-tiny-drone-going-against-big-guys-721594
Tom Salzer is an amateur radio operator in the Pacific Northwest, USA. He publishes a newsletter at https://www.randomwire.us/ and a radio and technology blog at https://etherham.com.
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