TEST: Mobius Mini, the 27g HD cam

[Drone News]

INTRODUCTION

The mobius was and probably still is the most popular compact and light camera, the faithfull compagnon for many many fliying machines. Recently was introduced the Mobius 2 integrating the 1080p@60 fps, an answer to the runcam HD2. Now under the bench, it’s the Mobius Mini, nothing else than a shrinked Mobius 2 with a total weight of 27g !!! The camera targets compact machines for examples quadcopter from 100mm … This mobius still allow you to film in 1080p@60…. That’s great.

BOX CONTENT

The mobius mini comes with a nice white packaging with a magnetic lock. Everything is well protected inside

+ 1 x Mobius mini (with a builtin 1S 300mAh battery)
+ 1 x USB charging cable
+ 1 x USB to AV cable
+ 1 x Tripod mount
+ 1 x Velcro band
+ 1 x Lens cap

No instruction manual…. every informations can be found online here: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?2697022-Mobius-Mini-Support-Thread-(READ-Posts-1-7-BEFORE-posting-questions)

OVERVIEW

The möbius mini is obvoiusly more compact and versus the möbius first edition, the gain in dimension is also important and by the way more compatible with tiny systems.

I would dream a full orange mini-Mobius camera …. much more easy to find when lost into the grass….
Not only the Mobius mini is able to film in 1080@60fps but also offers a 1440p@30fps…
List of all supported video modes are: 1920×1440@30fps, 1920×1080@60/50/48/30/25/24 fps, 1280×720@ 120/100/60/50 fps, 848×480@240 fps
For example, we have the 848×480@240 video mode for slow motion capture

All videos mode as well as all the different settings can be tuned via the same GUI software common for the Mobuis 1, Mobius 2 and Mobius mini (available here http://www.mytempfiles.info/mobiusmini/index.html)

-FRONT VIEW

The lens offers a FOV of 110 degrees but ….. no protection for it in case of frontal crash. The lens is in not common size, a M9 format.

-SIDE VIEW

Still coming in only black edition, the mobius mini now offshores buttons on latteral sides..
IMHO, it’s a better configuration since sometime you can have some elements installed on it triggering by accident the former Mobius model.

The right side welcomes the power button (long press on it to turn on/off the camera) and the microSD slot. Be aware, to enjoy full fps video mode resolutions, you will need at least a class 10 microSD card.
If lower, the mobius mini will detect it automatically and decrease the frame rate to the maximum supported by the microSD card. A good point IMHO.

The left side welcomes the shutter and video mode buttons. The first one triggers the recording/photo shooting while the second cyles between video mode 1/ video mode 2 and photo mode. If you connected the AVout cable, a fourth playback mode will be available.

When Video mode 1 is selected, you have a yellow LED color, flashing when recording. The lED turns to blue for the video mode 2 and red for photo. The LED light can be seen from the top and the left side simultaneously. A good point. More is turned on, another red rear light can added too.

-REAR VIEW

The central connector is a miniUSB port (as for the M1 & M2). As soon as you plug a miniUSB cable, the LED turns to green synonym of charging mode. When the internal 300mAH LiPo is charged the green light turns off. When plugged to a PC, the associated mtorage media is also opened to retrieve for example recorded videos/photos.

On the right side of the miniUSB port, you have a small hole where you can insert a thin tip to press a reset button. This button is in practice important since time to time, the camera even with the actuall firmware can crash. You will need to reset by pressing the reset button while turning on the camera. So it’s strongly advised to have with you such tiny instrument.

It happens to my mobius mini when I received it. It was impossible to turn on it. When the USB cable was inserted, the green light where there…. but impossible to turn on the camera. I had to charge a bit the LiPo then proceed to a full reset. After this first “bad” episode, the camera crashed only once during some settings modification from the GUI but never (yet) on the field while filming. Don’t be scarry, with the last firmare (0.58 actually) crashes occur rarely. I am sure futur firmwares will improve the situation.

-UPPER VIEW

-BOTTOM VIEW
You can see a metal structure to attach the camera tripod but playing the role of heatsink for the main processor.

-WEIGHT
A super light 27g

versus for example 45.1g for lens for edition of the mobius with the lens C2

To be more precise, all elements are weighting:

Stock camera (with battery & card)……… 27g
Battery (300 mAH)……………………….6g
Circuit board…………………………..6g
Lens module and ribbon cable……………..4g
Case Top……………………………….3g
Case Bottom with heat sink and buttons…… 8g

-LATENCY
If the first original Mobius suffered of high latency (> 100ms) incompatible in practice with FPV racing, can we expect an improved situation for the Mini ?

Here are some couple of photos for the 1080p@60 and 720p@60 with and without recording

– 1080p@60 w/o recording

– 1080p@60 w/ recording

– 720p@60 w/o recording

– 720p@60 w/ recording

As you can see, no influence of the recording for the latency and is in avergage is around 65ms…. acceptable for most FPV applications but not for ultra racing FPV conditions.
The latency is so slightly superior to the runcam HD 2 (~40ms)

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS AND TESTING

As you can see with recorded videos, the quality is very close to the runcam HD2 and it’s pretty good. With the default settings for both, maybe the mini is a little bit overexposed. Also since the FOV is narrowrer for the mini versus the runcam HD2, maybe the light adaptation/WDR when front the sun is inferiour. You can also observe unfortunatly more lens flares effect… the lens quality is inferior to the runcam HD2 for sure. I was able to record around 15min consecutively without problem. I don’t advice to push more this limit. Of course by default, the möbius mini record videos with 5min of lengh’s clip. At least you won’t loose all your flight session.

CONCLUSIONS

The third mobius camera inherits from all the goodies of ancestor: a really good GUI with ton of settings, easy manipulation and still with the great video quality. The massive argument is the 27g…. just amazing … and more, you can save some little grams if you plan to power it directly via the USB. THE AVout part is also improved with a lower latency (65ms) almost 100% FPV friendly With last firmware, the Mobius mini is reletively stable but can crash time to time during recording or at boot. Always think to have a fine tip instrument to reset the camera if happens. I would dream of a orange mini möbius with removable battery…

PROS

+ Super light camera (27g)
+ Great 1080p@60 quality
+ Many options available from the GUI software
+ ~60ms of latency

CONS

– No removable battery
– Crash time to time (need a very thin tip to reset)
– Lens not protected
– Lens flares
– No colored version

This camera have been courtesy provided by Banggood in order to make a fair and not biased review. I would like to thank them for this attitude.
You can find it actually for 70USD at http://www.banggood.com/Mobius-Mini-1080P-110-Degree-Wide-Angle-Super-Light-FPV-Full-HD-Camera-DashCam-60FPS-H_264-AVC-p-1092165.html

Cet article TEST: Mobius Mini, the 27g HD cam est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

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