so ive been watching fpv videos for like 6 months now and i finally want to pull the trigger on something. my budget is probably around 300-400 dollars to start. everyone i talk to says something different ? some say get a prebuilt and learn on that, others say just build from scratch so you understand how everything works when it breaks.

the thing is i have zero soldering experience and honestly the idea of wiring up an FC and ESC and all that from scratch sounds pretty intimidating. but i also dont want to buy something that i outgrow in 3 months or that has garbage components i cant upgrade. any thoughts? is there a middle ground here or do i just have to pick one and commit

honestly the prebuilt vs build debate has been going on forever and both sides have valid points but here's the thing ? if you have no soldering experience and you crash (which you will, a lot, early on), you're going to need to solder stuff back together anyway. so you're going to learn regardless. that said i dont think you need to start by building from scratch just to learn. something like the Diatone Mamba or even one of the BetaFPV whoop kits is a decent way to get flying without immediately frying a flight controller because you bridged a pad.

the Mobula 6 or 7 is actually what i'd suggest if you want something small to practice on indoors first. then when you actually know what you're doing with the sticks you can make a more informed decision about what 5 inch build you actually want. jumping straight into a 5 inch freestyle build with no stick time is just expensive crashes waiting to happen.

i started with a prebuilt Geprc last year and tbh i dont regret it at all. yeah some of the components weren't exactly what i would have picked myself but i got flying way faster and that mattered more to me at the time. eventually broke enough stuff that i learned to solder out of necessity lol. now i'm building my own stuff but i think having that initial prebuilt phase helped me figure out what i actually wanted in a custom setup