I'm completely losing it here. Even at 3 feet, the signal indicators never read full with high gain directional antennas, I get minimal yet constant corrupted pixels, and I'm always getting artifacting near dark edges. (like electrical posts) Signal penetration barely exceeds a single tree, and becomes poor halfway through my home. (My home is pretty bad for FPV, but 25mW analog beats 200mW HDZ in my case.)

Things I've tried include:
-Change power supply to 10v regulator or direct battery with oversized capacitor.
-Twist power and ground together.
-Try different antennas on TX/RX.
-Try different U.FL to SMA pigtails, or bypass pigtail and use direct U.FL antenna.
-Try different channels to dodge local interference.
-Move to areas with less multipathing.
-Disable Crossfire telemetry and create distance from transmitter.
-Reflash firmware to both units.
-Swap MIPI cable.

So far, nothing changes the outcome. The only things left I can think of are either bad MIPI or bad RX/TX. As I've only got one of each, I cannot test anything against another.

What kind of a HD Zero VRX are you using? Did you open it up to check if the antenna connector on the VRX internally is properly seated on the pcb board.

I've got the Race V2 model. The U.FL connector does appear to be well soldered to the board, but I could always redo the joints if it's a known issue.

Sorry, I was not concerned about the VTX, but rather the VRX. The video receiver in your goggles or the HDZero/Sharkbyte VRX module.

Oh, whoops. I've got the later HDZero model and not the older FatShark one. I'll try cracking it open and checking things out.

Update: All the joints inside look immaculate, minus the rocker switch which I accidentally tilted upon opening the unit. Nothing a little TLC with the hot iron won't fix.

At this stage, since you have exhausted all possibilities mentioned in your first post, its anyones guess without testing an another VTX/camera or VRX combo as a reference.

Yeah, I suppose you're right. I'm used to troubleshooting computers where I've already accumulated plenty of extra gear to check things against. It's frustrating to say the least. Wonder how long that freestyle VTX is going to take so I can rule stuff out.

Thanks for tossing me another thing to check!

get in contact with suppport. There is smth broken.

I'd hate to say it but I'm thinking along the lines of jasc ^^ ... you may have a defective Race v2 VTX. Personally, I've had zero issues with the original whoop vtx (I have 8 builds using it) although I am not impressed with the performance of the new lite whoop vtx (but that may be a function of my tight build). With that said, time and again I see posts about people having defective VTXs - whoop, Race, and freestyle. So it would seem their QA is suffering a bit likely with the mad pace of releases they are trying to achieve.

I'll get to it then. By the way, do the signal indicators show amplitude, or error rate? If it's error rate, that makes perfect sense to me. The signal output absolutely changes on command, but if it's cranking out constant data corruption, that would explain the low readout and the skittering pixels.

Thanks for the help!

Just an update to this situation. I have contacted Divimath technical support, ran through a thorough troubleshooting process, and they loaned me a unit to determine which piece of equipment was at fault. Upon finding that the test unit at 25mW surpassed the defective unit at 200mW, they instructed me to send both units to their California address, and I would be sent a replacement when they arrive.

I've never felt so respected by somebody during online tech support. Divimath is a very special company!

Hopefully this post isn't breaking a double posting rule. If it does, I'll refrain from such action in the future. Just wanted to clarify that the system is way better than my earlier posts would suggest.

Im glad they were supportive and will hopefully fix or replace your vtx.

Thanks for sharing your experience!