okay so ive been flying whoops for like 8 months now and i feel like im ready to move to a proper 5 inch build but every time i start researching frames i just go down a rabbit hole and end up more confused than before. like do i go with a stretched X, a true X, a hybrid? everyone seems to have a strong opinion and none of them agree with each other.

my flying is mostly freestyle, some light cruising in the park, nothing insane. i dont race or anything. budget is probably around 40-50 USD just for the frame itself. ive been looking at the ImpulseRC Apex and the Ethix S5 but also someone in my local group told me to just get a cheap chinese clone to learn on since ill probably crash it anyway. is that actually good advice or is it going to make my life harder when trying to tune?

also still figuring out if i should go analog or digital. leaning toward analog first just to keep costs down but open to arguments either way.

the clone advice isnt bad honestly, but it depends on the clone. some of them are genuinely fine and the arms wont snap on your first real crash, others are absolute garbage and you'll be reordering within a week. if you're going cheap frame route, at least look for ones with 4mm arms minimum for 5 inch. anything thinner and you're gambling.

for freestyle specifically though id actually just say grab a TBS Source One v5. its not the sexiest frame but its cheap, the parts are easy to find, its open source so theres tons of community support, and it flies pretty well once its tuned. saved me a lot of headaches on my first proper build. the Apex is great but its kind of overkill until you know what you actually want from a frame.

on the analog vs digital thing ? if your friends or local group is on analog, stay analog for now. the social side of this hobby matters more than people admit, being able to share goggles and do group flying is genuinely fun.

i went through the exact same thing like 6 months ago lol. ended up just picking the Nazgul5 because someone on youtube had a build video for it and i could just follow along step by step. probably not the most scientific way to choose a frame but honestly it worked out fine and i've crashed it like a dozen times and only broke one arm so far which was easy to replace.

dont overthink it too much is basically what i learned. the frame matters less than getting your motors and stack sorted imo