Good morning everyone, hope you are having a wonderful day today. Today we’re gonna be taking a look at a very nifty little optic from HOLOSUN. This is their new AEMS.
Full disclosure on the HOLOSUN AEMS we have had absolutely no contact with HOLOSUN whatsoever about this review, we paid $399 for it, which is a little bit underneath retail price for it, I believe we got it at Botach.com which often has some really good prices on HOLOSUN and VORTEX products. If you’re interested, I’ve also reviewed a lot of their other products on my personal channel as well, including the HOLOSUN HM3X which is a very good budget magnifier.
The Battery
Let’s get into the specifics on the HOLOSUN AEMS. Starting out on top we do, of course, have the solar failsafe technology, which is exactly what is says it is. It’s just if in case the battery dies you have a solar backup. It doesn’t charge the battery, do anything like that. It again just provides a backup in case that battery goes dead. We also have shake awake technology, which is quite nice, so, any time you leave the optic unmolested for a certain period of time it will turn off and then you pick it up it will automatically turn back on. This one here is equipped with the multi–reticle system which means you either have the two MOA dot or the 65 MOA circle or, of course, both.
Battery life is a very standard up to 50 000 hours of battery life, though again with an auto-on/auto-off functionality that is basically infinite or as long as that battery will actually hold the charge. In terms of battery type we are using a very standard CR2032, we have eight daylight and four night vision settings, the weight comes in at a whopping 3.9 ounces, which is quite nice and a very nice touch is that the material housing itself is 7075 versus 6061. 7075 aluminum versus 6061 is about double to two and a half times the strength to 6061 so, it’s a very good mechanical improvement. In terms of submersion we have ipx8 certification, which is again like 10 meters for 30 minutes or something like that. So, it is definitely diving capable if that’s something that you’re into. A couple other notable features on the AEMS is that we do have a side loading battery tray which is quite nice, it’s a very low profile, so that battery just slides in right underneath the optic body. We do have exposed windage and elevation, they are perfectly flush and actually a tiny, tiny bit recessed into the body so they’re never gonna get go going to get knocked on you.
We do have side rubberized buttons for adjustment up and down. I know some people online really don’t like rubber buttons, they like to see a big knob on the side that they can adjust and personally I think the rubber buttons are very low profile and very nice. I’ve never had a problem using them even with gloves on. As you can probably also tell is we have front and rear flip caps that are built in the optic itself. They are clear which is quite nice. You can use the optic with both of them up if you need to and certain circumstances, like I live in Western Washington where it rains about 200 days a year, so it could be very useful if you’re walking around doing more administrative tasks you put up the back window and then when you’re ready to go flip it down and now you have an unmolested clear, you know, without a ton of water on its back lens. You can also use it if you’re in a more muddy, dirty , sandy environment as well and it’s a nice feature and it will, of course, protect the front lenses if you’re just say transporting it around in a bag in a vehicle, something like that. Having those built-in caps is again just a very nice touch.
Mount
Externally, the one miss for me is that this is not a t2 patterned mount. This is actually a proprietary mount and mind did not come with any sort of riser plate though I’m not sure if they’re making one. I’m sure somebody out there will make a riser plate for it so the only other way to get a different mount on it or to change the mount height is, of course, to put a Picatinny riser on it. It’s a little bit of a miss. I think the mount design itself is good, it is made out of 7075 which is quite strong so I do like that. It does have an integrated recoil lug on the bottom and a very interesting feature, one of the only optics that I know of that has this feature is that the actual tightening screw has a little bit of a detent system in it, so you can kind of feel it click every like 16th of a turn or something like that and that, in theory, will help it not loose zero after it’s torque properly. I believe I have this torque down to 35 inch pounds and I never noticed any sort of shift in zero on whatever it is that I was using it. Now, as far as the actual glass and reticle goes, it’s all quite good except for a like one minor downside for certain people. So, first of the glass quality itself is quite nice. Now, you do have a very large window you have a very nice like one inch by one inch window which is a lot bigger than what you’re going to find on most of your micro style you know 20 millimeter objective lens and personally, I know it’s just a personal preference, but I really like larger windows even with red dots where you’re using both eyes open. It’s still just a nice touch and it is something that I personally like.
Multi-reticle System
When it comes to the reticle itself and the emitter HOLSUN has always done a good job of making sure that that two MOA dot and 65 MOA circle is all nice crisp and clear and has more than enough power, so on maximum brightness you’re really not even gonna be using that outdoors, you might be one or two steps down for maximum brightness even in full on direct sunlight where I normally shoot. I’m usually a couple settings down from maximum brightness because it does get extremely bright. Now, on top of that like I said before it is a very nice crisp two MOA dot so if you only want to use the two MOA dot just cycle off the outer 65 and MOA circle, that’s going to save you some battery life though again with the auto on auto off you don’t really need to do that because again that 50 000 hours of battery life or even say 5 or 10 000 hours of battery life is 5 or 10 000 hours of use time not total battery life because , of course, you’re only going to reach that 5 or 10 000 hours of battery run time if you actually are using it for that long and that is a long time to be walking around with one of these guns. As I said, with the reticle being very crisp and very clear, that means when you’re using it under magnification you can take shots at longer range and that reticle isn’t blooming out or overly large like you’ll see on some other, you know, quote on quote, two MOA dot that’s actually like five or six MOA so I’ll go ahead and roll in a couple shots here of me taking it out to four and five hundred yards but really with the red dot and magnifier it was not much of an issue whatsoever.
Magnification
The HOLOSUN AEMS is kind of cheating a little bit because one quirky thing about it and a couple of quirky things about it is that the glass itself has a very noticeable magnification to it so without a magnifier of course and just presenting the red dot as you would have a very noticeable 1.1, 1.2 sort of magnification which for me in daylight shooting didn’t really affect me whatsoever I mean it’s still gonna be better than like any LPVO or Prism optic. It is again just noticeable. It’s a noticeable warping a noticeable, you know, magnification effect, so while you’re using it you can definitely tell that there is a little bit of warping a little bit of magnification going on. For daytime shooting did not affect me whatsoever and again the glass itself is quite good, had no issues with that whatsoever, the reticle is very crisp but again it does just have a little bit of magnification to it a very obvious noticeable bad magnification to it, probably the most magnification that I’ve ever seen on a red dot though normally it’s fairly minimal. This one here is incredibly obvious. Not a major downside for most people, though I have heard that when red dots have a little bit of magnification to them it can make them more difficult to use with night vision compatible optic, you know, bigger window, more light, that sort of thing.
Sort of not necessarily tailored to that market, but it is definitely a feature set of the optics, especially for the price around 4 to 500 dollars you are competing with EOTechs and the vortex AMG “huey” at that price point and those have exceptional glass and night vision capabilities although a totally different reticle system. So, for me personally not really an issue again just something to point out, if you care this does have a very noticeable 1.1-ish magnification. Now, when it comes to actually shooting with the aims I like it a lot, I found it very fast, very intuitive, I like larger windows, I like two MOA dots and 65 MOA circles so for me personally up close end distance, I really like to use it, I had no complaints whatsoever from its actual shooting performance at least at daytime or under white light again no issues whatsoever In terms of its performance on par or better than most other micro style red dots on the market personally I would still prefer , in terms of like raw shooting capability and how much I personally like it, I would probably still take an EOTech or the vortex AMG UH – 1 over if for that but again for the size and weight , interesting feature sets a little quirky in that it’s not a t2 mount but it does, of course, come with a very nice mount and it has a very nice material choice of 70 – 75 which is something that I’m seeing a lot of newer more expensive optics start switching over into an actual higher strength material versus just the older , cheaper, easier to machine 60-61.
Summary
Overall, I think it’s a little bit of a quirky optic in the fact that, you know, it’s not a t1 so it’s just kind of is what it is out of the box. For me personally I like that a lot, I believe it’s lower one third co-witness with the bigger window makes it very, very easy to use, the red dot is very crisp so you can use it under magnification out to extended distances, of course if you have the skills to back that up. So, at the end of the day I do think it is a very good optic a very interesting optic if you are willing to live with a couple quirks. Now, again, all of my shooting is daytime or white light shooting. If you want this optic for dedicated night vision use, I would absolutely defer to somebody who actually has experience with it and there’s probably several of those videos online but again for what I used it for, for the money, I think it’s a bit of a hard sell especially when again for that 4 or 5 hundred dollar price range you are starting to compete with some really top-end optics. The core version I believe is a 100 dollars cheaper so it’s about 300 dollars and for that I think that that is a really good value, a little bit stripped down feature set doesn’t have the 65 MOA circle just a standard 2mo emitter, no solar fail safe but other than that has the same feature set the same quality materials. That optic is a much better value, but if you’re just looking for a something different if you have a thing for boxy optics, like a lot of us do, it has very good glass it has a nice big window, good emitter and the performance was very good no issues whatsoever.
