TEST: SKYZONE SKY03

[Drone News]

INTRODUCTION

Just after the TopFX F7X and just before the new Aomway commander V2, the Eachine EV200D, and the new Skyzone SKY03 offers a huge diagonal FOV of 43 degrees !!!! This must be compared with the 32 degrees of the former SKY02 V+ for example. The new FOV is not the unique novelty… The DVR module is also upgraded to record in H264 format the RF feed or any AVin source. The Sky03 still of course offers a builtin 48CH diversity 5.8G VRX, a frontal VGA camera, a builtin headtracker, the possibility to display an HD source via a miniHDMI plug and support 2D/3D Side By Side. Two other addings… a frontal horizontal LED bar light and antifog fan…. Let’s star to discover this new deluxe FPV goggles….

BOX CONTENT

+ 1 x Skyzone SKY03
+ 1 x Main facial mask
+ 3 x Foam addon masks
+ 2 x 5.8G linear antennas
+ 2 x Headtracker PS-2 cable
+ 1 x RCA to jack 3.5mm video cable
+ 1 x Powercable DC connector to XT60
+ 1 x Instruction manual (English)

Only one of the three facial addon foam masks has a double side tape.

OVERVIEW

The goggles chassis is more or less the same as for the SKY02.. the general plastic quality is great, very well build. You can find the Sky03 in black or white.

-FRONT VIEW

Immediatly visible the Sky03 integrates now a Fan on top as AntiFog solution. Unfortunatly no manual switch to turn on/off it. In practice you can adjust the rotation speed only via a setting in the general menu interface.

The white bar is the long horizontal LED light turned off by default. A lof of different visual effect can be selected in the general menu. Definitively a “cool” feature

The frontal camera is a basic CMOS VGA model with a limited FOV of 60 degrees. Despite being basic, it’s very usefull to monitor the front event especially at landing or take off periods.

-SIDE VIEW
Another novelty, now there is a powerbutton to be pressed more than 4s to turn on/off the goggles.

-REAR VIEW

By default, some diopter are installed… No indication about their respective correction…

But the size is compatible with typical diopters available in the market.

With the addon element taped on the main plastic clipsable facial mask. It’s really confortable with.

-UPPER VIEW

-BOTTOM VIEW
Centrally the two main sliders to ajust the IPD…from 57.5 to 69.5mm …. Maybe for very large heads,.. 69.5mm won’t be enough.

The PS-2 connector for the builtin headtracker module… working in PPM mode.

The main ports remain the same… Except the microHDMI has been replaced with a miniHDMI. We can fin a microUSB port to retrieve recorded file and to eventually flash a new firmware for the DVR. A microSD card port is also here… Be aware only good class 10 cards are accepted…. If not, when you will press on the “REC” button, nothing appears … or recordings stop after 1-2s maximum.

-WEIGHT

Close to 240g….

Builtin Screens

Each LCD screen offers a 800×600 resolution…. so in theory less than the 1280×1024 of the F7X’ LCOS screen. Anyway, the LCOS technology implies polarisation mirrors… and introduces some artefacts blurring a bit the general quality… So the main question for large FOV goggles: Is-it better to have a lower native resolution with a direct projection or an higher resolution but with mirroiring ?

Here is a direct view inside the goggles for an NTSC

in comparaison with the former SKY02 V+

It’s obvious that the FOV is largely increased…. The immersion is impressive. The aspect ratio is also in 4:3 format…

In comparaison with the 16:9 format for the TopFX F7X

I did a test with with these basic OSD information displayed in each four corners

For NTSC, it seems that the signal is partially cropped at each border, especially for the left and right borders….with few lines removed.

For PAL source rendition, we have for the SKY03

vs the SKY02 V+

and the TopFX F7X

With the following PAL layout

we obtain

For PAL… it’s more top & botton parts which are slightly cropped…

Anyway, whatever the TV system…. I find that the video signal is partially blurred when you wear the glasses especially in the central area. More whatever the IPD ajustement, you still have the feeling that the video is a bit doubled……. Clearly I am not sure that the default provided diopter provided by default are the right ones for normal view capacity. I asked to 2-3 other persons with perfect vision to confirm my impression (in comparaison with the Sky02 V+ results)… All of them confirmed my remarks. Paradoxally, when you look with one eye only one of the screen, the image rendition is perfect….

I also tested the AVin capacity… No problem to display an extern CVBS source…. More, you can record the external flux via the DVR

It’s a great little feature…. But dislike the SKY02 V+, the SKY03 won’t turn automatically when you plug a source in the AVin… you need to select manually the input into the AVin mode.

I was able to display without problem an HD source via the HDMI connexion… I tried different resolution from my laptop… each time successfully

For the SKY03 model, Skyzone gave up their former 3D system with a dual Vfreq to a more classic Side By Side

When you turn the goggle into 3D (long press the “mode” button, the 3D effect is perfectly rendered

MENU AND FUNCTIONS

If you long press more than 4s the large left “Camera”‘ button, you can run the band scanning. The process to overview the 48CH is relatively fast, less than 5-6s to scan everything. More a bar display is plotted with the #CH in the x-axis and the corresponding RSSI value in y-axis.

After the scanning, you can manually navigate into each Vfreq by pressing the “Rec” & “Mode” buttons. To quit the scanning mode, one more time long press the “Camera” button.

On the right side, if you long press this time the “Track” button, you enter in the main menu with five different panels.

The first one is dedicaced to headtracker module

The second more to the display settings: brightness, contrast, saturation, hue, sharpness

The third tunes the DVR where you can for example perform “cycling recording” replacing previously recorded file as soon as the microSD card is full. You have the option to start recording as soon as the goggles are turned on as well…

The fourth selects some OSD settings and the LED bar display mode. A lot of are available, around 25 different choices.

The last one controls the speed of the fan… without the possibility to turn off it completly… the minimum setting is “ultra low”….

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS AND TESTING

When you turn on the Sky03, the skyzone log appears during 3s. With the facial mask installed, the sky03 is really confortable. The buttons are easy to access. But as said previously, I felt not super confortable in term of focus…. for me the central section is a bit blurred and despite any PID ajustement, the left & right images superposition is not perfect with a very small presence of a doubling effect…. Well absoluptly nothing catastrophic don’t worry…. I am pretty sure with more adapted diopters (-400, -600 ?) the focus can be solved. As far I know it’s a problem more or less similar with the Fatshark HD3… Seems it’s really hard to produce a large FOV goggles with so small eyes-screens distance.

A raw example of an NTSC source

Notice the NTSC source is saved in 720×480 @25fps !!!… In general NTSC are saved into 30fps. The video looks a but choppy by moment… Clearly less good than any NTSC source recorded smoothly @30fps… I hope it can be solved by a firmware update. I least no desynchronization with an HD source… a good point for Picture in Picture post video editing.

More I noticed, sometimes the file stops by itself to record or produce a corrupted file …. Generally the DVR seems sensitivive to the quality/brand of the microSD card… I hope it won’t be like the walkera vitus where it was very hard to find a 100% compatible microSD card.

For PAL source,, we have

More time to time, the DVR refused to boot….and I needed to turn on one more time the goggles… sometimes, when you press recording, it starts to record but it stops by itself after a couple of second… Clearly, the DVR module seems sensitive to the microSD card choice. I used Toshiba Excecia pro U3 with a writing speed of 80mb/s for my testing so far superior to the 5kb/s required for the recording whatever a PAL or NTSC source.

CONCLUSIONS

Well …. I got mixed feeling with the new Sky03 model… If clearly I liked the general quality build, the accesories, all functionalities FPV oriented, all input/output ports…. the general quality of the screens, the capacity the display perfectly an HD source… I can’t not mention the little blurring/out of focus feeling I have when i wear them…. With an high probabitity it’s linked with the type of diopters coming with… but I am afraid most of owners will complain of the out of focus effect. Maybe 43 degrees it too wide ? It’s an open question.. Another negative point is the DVR erratic bahaviours when time to time it’s not recording well all the FPV session. More the NTSC recording looks a bit choppy with 25fps only….

PROS

+ Complete bundle
+ Great quality build
+ 43 degrees FOV
+ IPD ajustement
+ 2D/3D SBS
+ HDMIin
+ Builtin DVR
+ Frontal camera
+ Fan
+ Facial masks
+ Easy Vfreq scanning
+ Headtracker

CONS

– Central area blurred/out of focus ? Default diopter not adapted the normal vision case ?, too wide FOV ?
– NTSC recording @25fps instead of 30fps
– NTSC format partially cropped
– No 16:9/4:3 aspect ratio selection
– DVR module not booting sometimes
– Some Corrupted DVR recordings reported (rarely/depends the quality of the microSD card)
– Fan can’t be turn off completly manually

This FPV goggles 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 479USD at https://www.banggood.com/Skyzone-SKY03-3D-5_8G-48CH-Diversity-Receiver-FPV-Goggles-with-Head-Tracker-Front-Camera-DVR-HD-Port-p-1237218.html

Cet article TEST: SKYZONE SKY03 est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

View the full article