I haven’t tried the Adidas headset yet, but when my colleague Jon Porter tried it on his Urbanistas, the solar tech worked perfectly. We found that the battery drained very little, even indoors and without charging in the sun. Adidas doesn’t mention active noise cancellation (the one in Los Angeles) or a good audio codec, but it does have IPX4 water resistance, a mic, and a USB-C port for backup charging. increase. Engadget wrote that the sound of its predecessor, created by Zound, was very good.
Solar powered gadgets are nothing new. Logitech has been selling plug-free keyboards for over a decade. But do audio headsets with little solar panels fit into the design, of which he’s only tried one until this week. Now at least four. On Tuesday, Adidas unveiled his RPT-02 SOL. This is a $230 self-charging Bluetooth can (via Engadget) that has Exeger’s Powerfoyle solar cells built right into a recycled plastic headband. It’s the exact same solar technology as the Urbanista Los Angeles solar-powered headphones we tested last year, and it offers the same 80-hour “backup” battery life, even in a pitch-black room.
Highlights
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Even at this preliminary scale, no one thought the technology would take off. JBL funded a pair of such headphones on Indiegogo in 2019, but canceled the project and issued a refund.Another Indiegogo campaign for solar-powered earbuds by a company called Pearl Audio is currently It is “under review”. But at least for low-power devices like this, the technique actually works. And it’s really nice not having to think about charging your device.
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Urbanista also puts his Powerfoyle panel into a true wireless earbud set (technically, a charging case), and a company called Blue Tiger claims it’s “the world’s first solar-powered communications headset.” I released a thing. On sale late last month, the Powerfoyle cell and noise-cancelling boom his mic are back. The Blue Tiger Solare retails for $220. We also found this upcoming POC Omne Eternal bike helmet of his that uses cells to power flashing rear safety turn signals.