Olympia SoundBug Ultra-Portable Sound System (1-Speaker, Silver)

by Olympia

Product Details

Product Manual [3.99mb PDF]

• Item Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B00006IFT1
• Item model number: SB001
• Batteries: 3 AAA batteries required.
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 10, 2002

Product Description

Soundbug takes the signal from the audio device, and using world-first technology, effectively creates a sounding-board out of the surface to which it is attached.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pretty Good, October 2, 2002

By 

"alienfoil" (Buffalo, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Olympia SoundBug Ultra-Portable Sound System (1-Speaker, Silver) (Personal Computers)

Couple Notes
1. It's a pretty neat device, if you are interested in new and slightly nerdy technologies I would highly recommend it. Especially at the current amazon price which is the cheapest out there.
2. The device gives out a small amount of sound even before you attach it to something, this might be disappointing to some. The amplification effect when you do attach to a hard surface is definitely noticeable however.
3. You can push the volume pretty high with the device, the problem is I dont think it was made to handle loud output, you can get good sound at a nice volume level but if you start to blast the music the output from the device gets really distorted.
4. The sound quality is decent, not much in terms of bass though.
5. It's small, the size of a pager or small cell phone.
6. From what I understand the battery life is very good.
7. If you attach it to a piece of glass on something like a door the sound is about the same volume on both sides of the door, I thought that was neat.
8. Be carefull with it, if you attach it to a wall attach it near the floor or keep a close eye on it, the suction cup holds quite well but the device is heavy. I let it fall hard on the floor within my 1st hour of using it. The device survived but I don't know how much punishment it can take. Windows are your best bet for sure, anything that holds well with a normal suction cup will do fine.

Overall its a cool little gadget, if they improve the sound quality and volume threshold it will be a great product!

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Neat toy, but not terribly effective., January 4, 2003

By 

Michael A. Behr "mabehr" (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Olympia SoundBug Ultra-Portable Sound System (1-Speaker, Silver) (Personal Computers)

I got this in the hopes that it would substitute external speakers for my laptop; the ones in the laptop don't get loud enough for my tastes. The Soundbug *does* make sound loud enough, but only for some frequences, and it's so tinny and distorted, the sound is too unclear to be of any use!

Long and short of it is, it's a neat concept and yay to the engineers at Olympia who thought of it, but it's not terribly effective.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Very cool gadget, very lame performer., December 13, 2002

By 

Meredith W Cohen (Maine) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Olympia SoundBug Ultra-Portable Sound System (1-Speaker, Silver) (Personal Computers)

When I ordered this I knew not to expect much considering the price and the newness of the technology. When I received it, I was still very excited because it's such a cool concept, so I ran around (as I'm sure everyone has done) sticking it onto everything I could get my hands on. After that thrill wore off I sat back down at my computer and stuck it to the top of my desk and connected it to my Ipod. I had the volume pretty low so the sound was alright but what I soon found to be extremely annoying was the power saver feature. If I was playing a song that had very low tones or sound gaps the damn thing would power down and then come back on when the higher tones returned -not very cool at all for such a cool gadget. However, I did find that the powering down annoyance occured much more on my MDF desktop than on glass.

I find that it plays best on a piece of glass or on my Corian counter in my bathroom. The sound is never great but I still think it's a cool gadget as far as gadgets go. Right now I have it stuck to the glass on a painting hanging over my mantel and it actually doesn't sound half bad.

My final thoughts:
If you're an audio snob, skip it.
If you're a gadget freak, it's worth 30 bucks (unless you need that 30 bucks for your next meal or heating bill) -in that case, skip it.