So many FCs... which one?

Chris

Living the dream!
Looking at building myself a respectable mini.

5" frame, already got the motors and ESCs specced, just wondering about the flight controller.

There are so many out there, F3 this, Rev5 that, KISS... then there's the firmwares... Beta/clean flight?

I don't want one with too much on it... so built in PDB nope, built in OSD nope.

Just a FC that will run the latest (I think this is the best...) betaflight?
 

ElectriSean

Eternal Student
Mentor
The trend these days is to pack as much stuff into one board as possible to make it shiny and new, which definitely adds to the confusion. Any of the SPF3 clones will serve you well, they are pretty cheap and have no problems running the latest betaflight. I would stay away from the Naze32 and it's clones, as the latest firmware versions are pretty taxing on the CPU, I wouldn't be surprised to see them become unsupported soon.
 

PsyBorg

Wake up! Time to fly!
Each one has its perks and downsides. It all boils down to what features you want and what purpose your build is like Aerial photography or racing / freestyle.

So far I have used a Skyline 32 advanced because I thought I wanted to learn all the features. Decided that racing was more what I wanted so I went to a SPf3 clone and since then I have evolved again and gone with a full kiss setup. Of the three I prefer the KISS so far as it has been the easiest to tune as well as the most smooth. BUT I have flown and learned a lot during that evolution so I could possibly go back to the others and get similar results.

The Kiss setup is nice because it uses Dshot now which not only is more smooth it eliminates the need for esc calibrations. You can also flash the esc painlessly thru the gui now as well. I didn't have that with Cleanflight when I was using that. (note that these features are making their way into all the software as well)

So it boils down to what you wish to do and just a little reading of reviews or watching videos should help you make your decision easier.
 

anshuman2601

New member
It all depends on your flying style & needs. My personal best is the KISS FC, works best for high speed manuevers & drone racing. Although it has a completely different setup from the others like the Naze32 & SPRacing F3.
The Naze32 is a decent fc too. As in it, there are different revisions which are released(Rev5, Rev6), the latest being the Rev6. It has a newer gyroscope sensor which is more responsive.
Betaflight is a continually developing & more advanced version of cleanflight. Although it can be sometimes unstable on some fcs, but it still works better. The SPRf3 & AlienflightF3 boards are the best suited for betaflight. Although there are newer versions in development conatining the F4 processors like the Betaflight F4 & AlienflightF4.
There is even a newer version of betaflight called Raceflight, available as a chrome configurator. It allows even more functionality for newer boards & one can even program escs through it, no need to download & install the BLHeli suite.
I wouldn't recommend buying the Openpilot CC3D as it's functionality iss outdated. Its wiring is also a bit more clumsy.