With a series of innovations Sol Republic get it spot on
Amps Air wireless Bluetooth earbuds are the latest offering in wireless earbud technology by Sol Republic combining a sleek and attractive design with great sound and convenient functionality.
First of all let’s talk about the very stylish and attractive case that holds these earbuds. It’s a kind of pebble shape, made of plastic but with a brushed metal finish on the lid of the case and more plastic texture for the rest of the case.
Considering the shell is plastic it feels great and definitely makes the overall product feel top quality. The case that holds earbuds will charge your earbuds 15 times which gives you around 45 hours of usage overall, with about two to three hours of battery life for the earbuds themselves.
The flip up lid on the case does feel slightly on the creaky and delicate side and the magnet which snaps the lid shut isn’t the strongest, so I wouldn’t be surprised if it opened while in my bag and the earbuds came out.
Having said that however I do like the case, there are 4 lights on the front which indicate how much charge it has left. There’s a mini USB and standard USB slot under a little flap type thing on the side of the case which allows you to charge the case itself. It also doubles up as a portable charger so you can charge up your device when you’re out and about.
The case/battery pack holds a fairly impressive 2,200mAh of power, this will obviously not give most devices out there a full charge, although it is good for emergencies and I managed to get my device through the whole day by using some power from the case while still getting quite a fair bit of use out of the earbuds too.
Now, onto the main event, the actual earbuds. Let’s start by pointing out the obvious, they are fairly large in size, which may put some more active people off from buying them.
I’m not sure how well they would stay in your ear during a run or a workout as I’m the laziest person I know, and have not tested them during a workout. However, according to Sol Republic they are designed with ‘air grooves’ which apparently give a comfortable grip while in the ear to prevent them from falling out.
They are also sweat and rain resistant which is another great feature about these earbuds. I really like the design and I had no trouble with them falling out or becoming loose in my general day to day use while commuting.
The sound these earbuds produce is very impressive for wireless technology. The sound is rich and well balanced, the bass is deep and I hadn’t noticed any rattling where the bass is concerned.
The volume maxes out at a very high level, especially when using both earbuds, far louder than I would personally need them to be. Overall for Bluetooth earbuds the sound quality is great.
More on the functionality of the earbuds, I noticed that they do provide fairly good noise cancellation, as a daily user of the London Underground those trains can get VERY loud at times, but I had no trouble hearing my music and often didn’t notice any noise interference while using them.
Each earbud has a ‘multi function’ button which performs various actions depending on what you are using them for. For example, while listening to music – the button will allow you to pause/play your current song.
Long pressing and quickly pressing the button will allow you to decline or answer a call. You can also use the button to activate device features like the google assistant Siri.
There is an LED on each earbud to indicate things like battery level and whether or not they are connected. Another feature that sold it for me was that you are able to use one earbud at a time, switching to mono so you can still experience the full lustre of your audio and keeping the other on charge.
I don’t like being unable to hear any of my surroundings, especially when driving and using public transport, so this feature I loved. Many of the wireless earbuds I’ve used before only work when both are out if the case, which kind of defeats the point.
Which brings me to my biggest negative about the earbuds. If you have managed to put the earbuds onto the single setting its quite a bother to reconnect them back to the duel setting.
I had to turn them both off and on again several times, then put them back into the case at the same time, then take them back out again at the same time. Basically a lot of fiddling around to get them to work, which wasn’t ideal and quite annoying.
It took me a day or so to get the knack of it and I sometimes still have trouble with connecting them to each other specifically the right headphone which isn’t good.
Overall I am really impressed with these earbuds. The sound quality is really good considering there are no wires. The size of these earbuds may put some people off but the bulkiness allowed them to sit better in the ear and hold them in comfortably. Being able to use one at a time was a major plus, and seeing as the case charges both the earbuds and your device, you can’t really go wrong!