{"id":6053,"date":"2020-12-07T18:44:00","date_gmt":"2020-12-07T17:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/plus.maciejpiasecki.info\/index.php\/2020\/12\/07\/huawei-x-gentle-monster-eyewear-ii-review-more-than-meets-the-eye\/"},"modified":"2020-12-07T20:26:09","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T19:26:09","slug":"huawei-x-gentle-monster-eyewear-ii-review-more-than-meets-the-eye","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plus.maciejpiasecki.info\/index.php\/2020\/12\/07\/huawei-x-gentle-monster-eyewear-ii-review-more-than-meets-the-eye\/","title":{"rendered":"Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear II Review: More Than Meets The Eye"},"content":{"rendered":"

Huawei is back with its second-gen smart glasses, and the company once again partnered up with Gentle Monster. For those of you who don\u2019t know, Gentle Monster is a South Korean sunglasses and optical glasses brand. This is a relatively young company, as it was founded back in 2011. It managed to create a name for itself rather quickly, though. The two companies came up with the Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear II smart glasses, which is a mouthful, that\u2019s for sure.
\nThe two companies actually announced four different models for these glasses. They\u2019re only different in terms of the design, other than that, they offer the same set of features. The model that I got to review is called \u2018Smart Myma\u2019, and this is a fairly large pair of sunglasses, we\u2019ll get to that, though. Out of the four models that Huawei announced, three are essentially sunglasses, while the remaining ones are reading glasses. Yes, you can get a special set of regular reading glasses, and have some smart features in them.
\nWell-executed design, but they are a bit too wide
\nSo, the design. The Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear II smart glasses do look like a regular pair of glasses. They do have thicker sides, but they\u2019re not obscenely thick, not at all, They are just a little bit thicker to accommodate speakers, and touch panels that you\u2019ll find there. We\u2019ve seen much worse implementations of such components. It\u2019s actually almost impossible to know these are smart glasses just by casually looking at them. If you take a closer look, you\u2019ll see the speakers, though.<\/p>\n

This particular pair that I reviewed, is quite wide. My head is not small, and yet they feel a bit large for me. There are smaller variants, though, so you\u2019ll just need to figure out what pair fits you. I can only speak for the ones I reviewed, of course. Having said that, they are quite wide, and the lenses are flat. That results in some glaring on the sides, it\u2019s as if you have rearview mirrors on the sides of your eyes, kind of. You do get used to it rather fast, though, it\u2019s not something that will continuously annoy you. Besides, if you do get the right size, you won\u2019t have this problem at all.
\nThe glasses themselves do feel quite sturdy, despite the fact the connection with the sides doesn\u2019t inspire confidence. As you can see, the main part of the glasses is connected to the stems with a rather thin piece of metal. As I already mentioned, this doesn\u2019t really inspire confidence, but it\u2019s quite sturdy, surprisingly sturdy. It is also worth mentioning that Gentle Monster used titanium elastic hinges here, which is why it managed to keep them so small. Needless to say, titanium is considerably stronger than your regular metal. I don\u2019t think this will be an issue in the long run, at all, but we\u2019ll see.
\nThe glasses themselves combine metal and plastic when it comes to the build materials. They are a bit heavier than your regular smart glasses, but they\u2019re not heavy to the point you\u2019ll be annoyed by them. Quite frankly, Huawei and Gentle Monster managed to keep them quite light at 48.1 grams. Do note that this is the weight of my pair, the rest of them are even lighter (44.6, 45.45, and 44.2 grams, depending on the model).<\/p>\n

Quality, hardshell charging case
\nThese smart glasses come packed inside a rather fancy case. That is a hardshell case, which will keep your glasses protected when you\u2019re not wearing them. This is not a regular case, though, as it also acts as a charging station. The idea is similar to what you get with truly wireless earbuds, actually, well, kind of. This changing case does not come with a battery of its own, like cases for TWS earbuds do. You will need to connect the case into a power source, while the glasses are on the inside in order to start the charging process.<\/p>\n