Drones used to drop compounds as loot (affectionately called drone poop) that could be refined in to materials that normally required null-sec mining. It was incredibly profitable and made regular mining almost pointless (gun mining) so it got nerfed. Drones instead got bounties like everybody else, but their loot drops are almost always empty, you can just salvage the wreck. Because of that, there isn't a lot of profit to be had compared to other areas... it is kind of a wasteland. But, wastelands can be fun too :)

I find generic drone anomalies in general have much more frequent faction spawns.
Generic drone npcs have no drops.
"Sentient"drones drop drop at least 20m right off the bat. Usually get 30-40 in drone parts from any given drop, haven't gotten a chip yet.
Most regular faction spawns like dark blood or true Sasha or dread guristas usually only drop a crappy tag and faction ammo. Rarely get anything worth more than 5m. If your up for combat I'd go in and do all the drone stuff. I couldn't put an accurate number on it but personally I'd guess 1 out of 6 will spawn a sentient drone which is good money for very easy high sec work.
Sure i occasionally get a faction or dead space item from other guys but the drone parts are more reliable.