Oakley Thump MP3 Sunglasses Review

The 128MB Oakley Thump sells at Circuit City for $399.99.
The 256MB Oakley Thump sells at Circuit City for $499.99.
Oakley Thumps are traded on eBay at lower prices.

Overview
I was supposed to receive those earlier this year for review, but there where some shipping issues. On the other hand back then was winter and sunglasses were not that necessary. I received the 256MB Night Camo / Black Iridium Polarized model. I am not a camouflage guy and also just wear Oakley glasses for mountain biking. So I was not falling in love with the looks of the glasses. They surprisingly look good on our Gadget Model Christine. I have to say this right now: never ever wear it with the lenses flipped open. It is dorky to say the least. That is why you will not see a photo of Christine wearing it flipped open. Convenient yes, but dorky!

The technical design of the Oakley Thump is actually very nice. The glasses are extremely light with a weight of 52g. The iPod shuffle weighs 22g and that without polarized sunglasses. The MP3 Player components are well integrated into the temples. The casing is held together by little screws. The integrated headphones are adjustable in three dimensions. For people with a small head they might still not fit.

To charge the Thump glasses I connect it to the USB port. On one temple a USB mini plug is present under a plastic door. A 3 hour charge gives a 6 hour play-time. Obviously 6 hours is not that great, the iPod shuffle can do 12 hours. Connected via USB the mp3 player sunglasses registers as a USB mass storage device and I can copy MP3 and WMA audio files to the glasses.
As with the iPod shuffle the Thump mp3 player has no display. The glasses have one indicator LED and use audio cues to indicate on/off state change or low battery indication. The audio cue is not a little beep its actually sounds like a Thump or heartbeat - nice touch.

To operate the music player buttons on each temple are available. On the right temple are the play/stop/on/off button, next button and previous button. On the left temple are the two volume control buttons. Although the operation is pretty intuitive the embossed icons on the inside of the temples are only readable in ideal light conditions. Coloring the icons would make them much easier to see.
The sound is really good even with not having the ear-buds entirely inside the ear. They float a bit in front of the ear tunnel. There are no equalizer settings or other sound options, but I found there is no need to change anything. The maximum volume level is decent, but not super loud.

Conclusion
Oakley offers with the Thump an innovative and well-designed wearable gadget. Oakley sunglasses are already a matter of taste. The Motorola Oakley Razrwire Bluetooth headset sunglasses feature already a more elegant design. Maybe Oakley will also introduce a metal frame version of the Thump in the future. The MP3 player is nicely integrated and the weight of the glasses is still low enough for comfortable wearing them. The sound is great, the price is not. 500 dollars for a 256MB mp3 player is hard to stomach, even for hard-core early adopters. The Thump sunglasses are out now since a couple of month, maybe it is time for Oakley to reduce the price. Oakley Thumps are traded on eBay at lower prices.


How to Buy
The Oakley Thump and Thump accessories sell at Circuit City. See links below.
The 256MB Thump sells for $499.99. The 128MB version sells for $399.99.
See also Thump listings on eBay.

Oakley Thump 256MB Sunglasses (05150C)	Oakley Thump 128MB Sunglasses (05151C)
Oakley Thump 256MB Sunglasses (05152C)	Oakley Thump 128MB Sunglasses (05153C)
Oakley Thump 256MB Sunglasses (05154C)	Oakley Thump 128MB Sunglasses (05155C)
Oakley Thump Soft Vault (07-858)	Oakley Thump Soft Box (07-859)
Oakley Thump Wall Charger (07-860)	Oakley Thump Car Charger (07-862)

More Photos
Hi-Res Photos in the Oakley Thump Photo Gallery.

Specification Oakley Thump