"But Choppergirl, I really, really, really want to buy something... RC... expensive!"
We're getting to that. Your first purchase should not be a quadcopter or goggles.
Your first purchase should be a radio, to use as a USB controller to fly the simulators with. You'll connect it to your PC via a USB cable or if you are nerdy, a dongle... but most likely, a USB cable. You'll also need to buy batteries for it.
So your first shopping adventure, assuming you already have a qualifying PC and GPU, is to buy a radio controller / transmiter, otherwise known as a "TX" for short (abbreviation of transmit).
There are several candidates to consider, but it will come down to which you think you will like best to hold in yourhand for long periods of time.
I myself use Radiomaster TX-16s's with stock HAL gimbals, but there are many other options.
The newly released Radiomaster Boxer looks like a potentially appealing radio. There is also the TX-12, The T-Lite. There are offerings from Jumper. The TX-18, the TX-16, the Zorro. There's TX's from Flysky, Frsky, Futaba, etc. All have their merits and flaws to some degree. PIck the one that you can live with their flaws.
I would recommend if you are a babe in babeland, go with the Radiomaster Boxer. It's cheap, it has HAL gimbals, and it looks to be a solid entry radio. Youc an't go wrong with it. You can order one from RDQ (racedayquads), GetFPV, or any number of a hundred other hobby shops or pick up a used one one ebay. You will also need to source a battery pack for it or some batteries for the battery tray. You can probably get a battery pack for it from RDQ as well. I myself would have no problems rocking a Radiomaster Boxer.
Now, the hard part. You have to get the software installed, and create a model inside EdgeTX or OpenTX on your radio, to talk to your computer to control the simulator. This is a challenge in itself. There are quite a few Youtube videos on it and you'll probalby have to watch a bunch of them,a s it's a steep learning curve. To get up and running though, all you need to so is setup the gimbals and a reset toggle switch onyour controller, and maybe a flight mode switch to flip between Angle/Horizon/Acro mode.
After you do ALL THAT (phew), then it's time to LEARN TO FLY.
Expect to spend several hundred or thousand hours doing this. Don't sweat it. You'll love it. It will be like playing a video game, because, well, it is. More than likely you've spent thousands and thousands of hours mastering your favortie video game already without a second thought to it. So don't balk when I tell you, don't hit the real skies with real hardware until you've put in at least 250 hours minimum in a simulator... but really, 1,000 would be better, 2,000 even better.... 3,000 now you're getting good. 5,000, now you're wehere I am right now.
And here's the bonus with going with the Choppergirl Method.
You can beat that quad in the simulator all to death crashing non stop, a nd it won't cost you a thing.
It won't cost you any time to repair, any motors to re-buy, any soldering to do, any software to tune or reconfigure.
You can spend all that time, and you should... doing something I call... FINDING YOUR PERFECT RATES.
Once you can whip a quad around deftly in a simulator, and have basically crashed your way to becoming a decent or good pilot, then you can move on to the next phase, actually start shopping around for some hardware to try out int he sky.
By then, you will have a much better idea of what's out there, what you want, what is cheap, what is premium, what looks appealing to you for goggles and so on, if you want to use them at al, etc.
Then you will face the next biggest hurdle, learning to configure a flight controller... Betaflight, KISS, Quicksilver, etc... and tuning it... both of which are a hill to climb and a headache of their own right. Lots of videos on those things as well.
But learn to fly first. Before you smash a quad through a car window or get one tangled up in some little girl's hair because you can't control it because it's like trying to control a twitchy bull... not because you are just a new pilot or inherently bad... no... but because by default the stock rates on quadcopters (and in the sims) are actually set to some horrid default numbers which are almost unfliable. It's like trying to ride a twitchy bucking bronco bull. And you never took the time to tune them in a simulator and find ones that were.. reasonable and managabel.. and not insane.
And yet many pilots, including pretty good pilots, fly these terrible rates, because they didn't know either. You can spot them instantly because they are the "pinchers" that hold the sticks with two fingers (the wrong way), because they have to make the tiniest of movements because their roll rates are set 5x too high (the defaults). Don't follow in their footsteaps. There is in fact a lot of bad information out there, and a lot of "good pilots" that actually have and use a lot of very bad practices. Pinching, short throw gimbals, high rates, etc. You'll actually want as long sticks as you can have and comfortably use, and I'll explain later,a nd you'll want your thumb on top. And no, it's not a personal preference thing, there is a right way and a wrong way. But once you learn one way, it's hard to unlearn so... c'este la vie. HOld the sticks how you like to hold them, makes no difference to me.
This is, actually a hobby, and the goal is to have fun. You won't make any money at it.
You're path to becoming a great pilot, perhaps one of the best, is to treat and consider it like Play. Play Play. Because when humans are playing, they are in the zone, they are care free, they are free to take risks and try new things, the stress and pressure melts away and it's all just great fun. So when it is no longer fun, time to stop, pivot, rethink things, and reboot. Again, you won't make money at this. It's very unlikely, so consider it as I should of in the beginning, a hobby. I myself got snookered into the whole "professional drone pilot" rot. The reality is, nobody will pay you to fly an RC toy around the sky.
So, get busy building that Simulator environment, and start looking around at transmitters.
For the moment, forget about the goggles, and the quadcopter models. You can start watching Youtube videos aobut hem and get the lay of the land as to what's out there... analog, HDzero, DGI V1 / V2 / Goggles2(O3), etc. Forget your smart phone as an FPV device. You will use it, but for other things, like SpeedyBee configs or GPS maps and as a camera. But not as an FPV flying device.
Don't even think of flying anything real int he sky until you get at least 300 hours in a sim.
You can buy prodcuts from DJI that are all in one pacakges to tool a drone around the sky (DJI Avata) with gimbals and obstacle avoidance, but for anybody other than say my or your grandmotehr, I recommend you avoid these. If all youw ant to do is get up there and look around, a hot air balloon from the Dollar Tree on a string with a Go Pro taped to it is a far cheaper way "to just get up there and look around"
It's going to take you that long anyway just to learn your way around Betaflight, for example, and configure a pre-bulit BND (bind and fly) quad and get it and some goggles bound.
Perhaps I'll write a second installment to this post, NOW that you've got your sim installed and up and running, WHAT NEXT?
Let me know if you guys would like a continuation to my post.
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Choppergirl is the world's best PADP proximity aerobatic dance pilot.
All opinions expressed are my own. Sorry for the typos and grammar errors, I'm blind.
NOt a joke. I'm actually, blind. As in I can't see my fingers if I hold out my hand as far as I can and look at it.
Subscribe to my Youtube Channel to see some real fun flying. : - )
Don't fly. Swim though the air like it was water.
