For the techy skiers and snowboarders, the future is definitely here. Today we take a look at two of the most high-tech ski goggles out there. With technologies like GPS, head-mounted displays, built-in real time accelerometers, altitude tracking and jump statstics, you’d be forgiven to think that we are talking about some futuristic military hardware. Skiing / Snowboarding has never been cooler (and geekier).

Oakley Airwave

image courtesy of Oakley.com

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Top Gun eat your heart out. Oakley’s Airwave goggle is the new king of the hill. The $599.95 specs have taken ski equipment to a whole new level. Not only do these stylish glasses protect your eyes, but they can be a gateway to a whole world of information. Wearing these bit of technology, you can always stay connected to your friends.

The goggles have a range of eye-catching features. As a sports accessory it really shines. It can calculate your speed and distance, so you can keep track of your performance.

A display in the corner of the goggles appears like a 14” inch screen that is five feet away from you. The display offers a myriad of stats and information and can be connected to Bluetooth-powered devices such as your iPhone or Android Device. Oakley’s Airwave high-tech glasses allow you to read emails and read maps while you are out on the slopes as well. That’s right, you can read emails (and text messages) on thesegoggles. There is a handy caller display function as well. James Bond won’t have nothing on you when you put on these bad boys.

The “heads up technology”, typically utilised by the air force for fighter pilots, also allows you to choose what music you wish to ski to.

A friend-location setting allows you to find your buddies on the slopes. Very important in case you get separated from each other, or in the event that you feel a sudden overwhelming desire to show off your amazing new goggles and put them in the shade.

Zeal Optics Z3 GPS

image courtesy of Ubergizmo.com

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Zeal’s GPS technology is the icing on the cake of an otherwise excellent product. Touted by Zeal as “The most technically advanced goggles on the planet” The Z3 GPS Ski Goggle’s quality is superb. No matter what the light and weather conditions, you’ll always feel that the goggle is delivering the maximum possible clarity of vision. Thanks to its photo-chromatic, polarized, spherical lens, the goggle easily outperforms all but a handful of its rivals in the vision stakes. An exceptionally sturdy build further justifies the $549.95 price tag for these durable specs.

Of course, as well as the goggles bring you a little more than simply great clarity of vision and build. Its GPS feature is spectacular, and for the serious skier it is a great tool to navigate your runs. You can choose what stats you wish to see on the screen all through the day. A recording facility keeps track of every run which you can look at later on the free ReconHQ software, downloadable from the Zeal Recon website. Then after a hard day’s skiing, you can chill out in front of the computer with your mates and show them what gnarly runs you did using the HQ software.

There are a variety of viewing options that allow you to choose a specific run and have the recorded stats on the side-bar in real time. The software utilizes Google Maps to overlay your runs so you can choose between Map, Satellite, Hybrid or Terrain on which to overlay your tracks.

When in real-time viewing you should be aware that the screen is small, and this limits how many stats you can view at any one time. So, you will need to scroll through the various screen choices to see all of the stats. The batteries cover you for a good day’s skiing at about six to seven hours.

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