Review: Eachine Wizard X220 V3 FPV Drone

The Eachine Wizard X220 V3 is a budget 4S 5″ FPV racing drone you can buy off the shelf. You can get start with flying without building the whole drone by yourself which saves a lot of time and effort, but is it worth it and does it fly well? Let’s find out in this review.

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Where to Buy?

Get the Eachine Wizard X220 V3 here:

BG: https://oscarliang.com/product-98zf (12% off coupon exp 13 Sep: BG220V3)

It doesn’t come with a receiver, I recommend using ExpressLRS: https://oscarliang.com/product-7eb6

You also need to get some batteries, 4S 1500mAh is a good size: https://oscarliang.com/product-tp50

In the box it comes with:

• 2x battery straps (20*200mm)
• 2 sets of propellers Racerstar 5143×3
• GoPro TPU Mount
• some zip ties
• RX antenna mounting tubes

Specs and Features

• Flight Controller: ICE F405-PDB
  • MCU: STM32F405
  • GYRO: BMI270
  • Barometer: BMP280
  • Blackbox: 16M Memory
  • Input: 2-6S Lipo
  • Mounting: 30.5X30.5mm
• ESC: ICE T-35A
  • Input Voltage: 3-6s lipo
  • Operating Current: 35A
  • Peak current: 40A
• VTX: MT5G8 5804 (40CH 0mW/25mw/200mw/600mw VTX Switchable)
• FPV Camera: RunCam Phoenix2
• Motor: 2207.5-2550KV
• Propellers: Racerstar 5143
• Recommended LiPo: 4S 1300-1600mAh
• Weight: 358g without LiPo, 551g with 4S 1500mah

The Wizard X220 is a budget Drone

I’ve never owned a Wizard X220 until now, so I can’t really compare the V3 to the previous versions. My first impression is that, you get what you pay for really, there’s a reason why it’s so cheap. You simply can’t compare the Wizard to other more expensive options.

If you really have a small budget, $200 is the absolute maximum you can spend on a drone, then the Wizard X220 V3 will definitely get you in the air and let you practice flying. It actually flies pretty well after some tuning which I will share with you in this review. However I think Eachine could have done better in many small details.

Also, some of the design choices are very “2019” – F405 FC, Single BLHeli_S ESC, 4S, cable for Frsky R-XSR receiver…

The one thing that is 2022 would be the USB-C port on the FC.

With that said, the quad is totally functional, it’s got the latest BMI270 gyro, VTX SmartAudio works, and it’s got a buzzer and RGB LED that are missing on many more expensive models…. Can’t complain really for the low price. There are also LED underneath the motor, but they are covered by 3D printed TPU skids, only visible at night.

And I hope Eachine would start selling spare parts like motors, ESC’s, arms, frame plates etc separately to make repairing cheaper. At the moment none of these are available.

Closer Look at the Wizard X220 V3

The frame feels very stiff, sturdy and strong, that’s a good sign for durability and decent flight performance. The arms are 5mm thick, held in place by only 2 bolts which is a clever design, makes it easy to replace the arms. However I don’t seem to be able to find spare arms online so not sure if that matters after all.

Some bolts on the frame and motors are not fastened securely. And the motor screws used are 1mm too long, a couple of them actually dig into the motor windings if you tighten them too much.

You will notice there’s only one FC board in the quad with a VTX sitting on top. It’s a flight controller with power distribution built-in. I have not seen this type of board for a few years now. It’s usually used together with single ESC’s that are mounted on the arms.

The advantage of single ESC over 4in1 ESC is that they are cheaper to replace if you damage one of them. But again, I can’t find those ESC sold separately… Also it would be nice to have some protection on those ESC, bent propellers in a crash could damage them (rarely happens but better safe than sorry).

The FPV camera lens needs more protection from crashes, for now I just push the camera back a little bit.

To install the GoPro TPU mount, it needs longer screws which are not included. The mount fits GoPro 5, 6 and 7.

Out of the box, it comes with a 3-pin receiver cable which is for the R-XSR i assume. Poor choice in my opinion as it’s not a popular choice anymore these days. But it’s still better than not including anything at all I guess, so credit to Eachine where credit is due.

VTX antenna needs to be strapped to the frame, otherwise if it gets caught by a branch in a crash, the antenna can get pulled away from the VTX, which ultimately results in the VTX overheating without an antenna attached.

When it comes to configuration, there’s little, it’s basically Betaflight default. In the next part I will show you how I set up mine.

How to Setup

First thing first, I don’t like how they mount the FC stack. I normally use a long bolt and put a nut in between the frame and FC to minimize any movement. I recommend using a 30mm long bolt here.

Next up is installing the receiver. I am using the Radiomaster RP2 with tower antenna because it’s the only ELRS receiver I have left. I recommend using one with external antenna like the RP1 for better range.

The ESC comes with BLHeli_S 16.7 firmware. I flashed mine to Bluejay (24KHz PWM) so I can enable RPM filter in Betaflight. Tutorial: https://oscarliang.com/bluejay-blheli-s/. I needed to reverse motor 1 and 4 to run “Props in”, if you want to run “props out”, reverse motor 2 and 3.

Default CLI dump can be found here.

The FC target is GEPRCF405, it’s loaded with Betaflight 4.3.1 (Jul 13 2022) out of the box.

Flight Performance

I flew the default settings, quite decent performance given it’s not been tuned yet. But it can definitely fly better once tuned.

Unfortunately one of the ESC died on 2nd flight, so I couldn’t do anything further with testing. Therefore I cannot recommend this quad for this reason. No replacement ESC is available for sale also. I might try to replace it with an ESC of different brand and see if I can carry on flying it and tune it.

Update 26 Sep 2022 – I fixed it

Upon close inspection, one of the ESC died because the FET is damaged as you can see. That happened on second flight.

I also found that the LED below the motor is actually connected to two of the motor pads on the ESC, so they light up when the motor spins. People have been doing this for a while and I think it shouldn’t cause issue as those LED draw very little current.

I simply swapped out the faulty ESC with a spare ESC I have. It’s different brand (Emax) and specs (30A), but it’s also BLHeli_S ESC. I flashed it with Bluejay just like all the other ESC’s on this quad, running DShot300, all seem fine so far. I will test it further later this week and report back.

Update (27th Sep 2022) – Another ESC died

Another ESC just failed (one MOSET must have died), and the motor just twitches when moving throttle and motor doesn’t spin. Very disappointing ESC hardware quality, I will probably replace all the ESC and give this quad away to somebody who need it.