Blade mSR RTF

Wow this thing is fun
This helo is great fun. It's not for people who don't have good hand eye coordination or who don't understand how helos fly. But I started with this chopper and had it flying well within days. Definitely get the training kit to protect it from damage, and be prepared to replace some parts. I've crashed it about 80-100 times and just had my first two breaks: I bent the blade grips and snapped one of the little ports the trainer plugged into. The latter was fixed with some tape, but the former will need new parts. Well worth it!

super-durable little RC for beginners
Perfect if you're just starting out.

This thing is small: slightly bigger than a man's hand. This is a big advantage, since if you're just learning how to fly these things (heck even if you've been flying them for a while), you're gonna crash it often. But since there's not much heft to this thing, it's actually hard to damage.

A lot of folks when they get into this hobby buy a much bigger and more expensive helicopter, but they just end up crashing them all the time in the beginning, as everybody does. Even if money's no object for your, that will still mean you're going to be heading off to the repair shop after nearly every flight.

But this one -- man! You can smack it into walls, trees, chairs, etc., and it usually doesn't get damaged. If it does, you're looking at or to replace this part or that.

Another advantage of starting with a small one like this is that, once you get your Ming vase out of the way, you can fly it indoors. With the larger ones, you're going to have to wait for a calm day. And when I say calm, I mean, eerie, Twilight Zone levels of stillness.

Trust me: start with the tiny ones. You'll know when you're ready to graduate.

Challenging, but fun!
After enjoying the MCX so much, I wasn't sure if I should buy the MSR, the CP Pro, or jump straight to the Blade 400, which will be my next heli. I almost went with a CP Pro since the price is close but you get a good 6 channel radio with the CP. Thing is, you get a better 6 channel transmitter with the Blade 400, so the MSR BNF still seemed like the most cost effective stepping stone.

At first, I thought I made a mistake because the MSR was much more unpredictable than the MCX, and I thought the problem was partly the imprecise basic transmitter. But after some practice, most of the the unpredictability was due to me learning single-rotor flight characteristics. The basic radio is definitely too vague and clunky for the MSR, but it is adequate.

I find the MSR a little frustrating because it can (and often does) go way too fast for indoors, but at a mere 0.8 ounces plus 0.2 for the battery, any wind blows it away. It's a great little performer without a reliable venue.

Great: Maneuverability, speed, overall durability, single rotor, sounds angry, extra tail rotor and mixing flybar, comes with two batteries (uses one at a time) and a great 4-battery charger with a wall plug.

Frustrating: Unstable in a light wind, too sporty for the basic transmitter (precision control is much better in the low rate mode, but then it lacks the control throw to move any faster than an MCX), flight time per battery is shorter than the MCX even with the 120mAh battery.

The MSR's surprising, MCX-like durability was definitely the best reason to choose it as an intro to single rotor flying.

Tons of fun, but beware of the tail boom assembly.
This helicopter was so much fun..... until a very weak crash dislodged the cap of the tail motor.
I only had about two hours of flight time and just a few very weak crashes before this happened.

I researched this and found that this is a very common problem with the mSR.

If you buy this Heli, it will be lots of fun but be prepared for the worst and keep an extra tail boom assembly on hand (EFLH3002).

Great "Next Step" Heli
I love this helicopter. It's probably not the best starter heli, but is an outstanding step up as a second heli from a Blade MCX or MCX S300. It's fast and mine has had no problems and has survived a bunch of crashes. Once you get this, though, you will want to get a DX6i or similar controller to be able to adjust the settings more precisely. Highly recommended.