Gaming headsets

Open discussion about any topic, as long as you abide by the rules of course!
Post Reply
Don Carlos
Posts: 17508
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Gaming headsets

Post by Don Carlos »

Anyone got any really solid recommendations for a PC gaming headset?

I've doing up my study so I have chosen a good desk, some nice storage solutions for my vinyl and I having a large bookcase made. So now I am moving onto PC bits and bobs and a headset is up there with my wants. They won't be used for music or films, purely gaming, so how they sound with your favourite album isn't a concern.

So, recommend away :)
User avatar
shaft
Posts: 12473
Joined: Fri Dec 10, 1999 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by shaft »

Audeze Mobius or the cheaper hyperX cloud orbit variant without the head tracking.
User avatar
Mat Linnett
Posts: 2477
Joined: Wed Apr 12, 2000 7:00 am
Location: The Grizzly Grotto

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Mat Linnett »

I went for a full-on audiophile quality set last year, buying the Audeze Mobius, but was massively disappointed with my purchase.
In trying to squeeze as many features as possible in to the headset, they ended up producing a heavy and user-unfriendly headphone.

Admittedly, the sound was pretty good, but in hindsight, even that may have been partially confirmation bias.

So I ended up going back to my trusty old Sennheiser PC 363D, and it made me completely appreciate it anew. It's light, the sound quality is excellent, and it's no-nonsense. I don't have to do any set-up before playing a game or anything. Yeah, you have to install a driver for the USB soundcard it comes with, but that's once-and-done.
With the Mobius, because all the processing hardware was on-board, I had to remember to reset my recording device in Windows every time I powered it on.

If I buy another headset any time soon, I'll probably look at getting the Sennheiser GSX-1000 gaming headphone amplifier, an audiophile-quality normal headphone and an in-line boom mic like this V-MODA one.
Speaking of V-MODA, my commute headphone is the V-MODA Crossfade M100.
I used to use a Sennheiser HD25 II (the choice of DJs and post production audio suite operators worldwide), but there's a manufacturing flaw with them where you end up having to replace the main cable frequently.
The V-MODA set is excellent and incredibly well-built, folding away in to a neat little hard clamshell case for transport. The main cable is fully detachable from the headphone itself, and there's a good amount of metal used in the construction, meaning it feels noticeably sturdier than a lot of headphones out there at the same price-point.

I also bought the Astro A40 back in the day as well, but that's nowhere near as good as Sennheiser sets in my experience. Maybe the newer kit's good.

So my takeaway would be, for a gaming headset, you can't beat Sennheiser's stuff, and if you then want to take things a bit more seriously, look at the in-line boom mic, headphone amp and a quality stereo headphone.
I would say if you want to just buy a gaming headset, look to spend around £200 for a really good one.
My PC 363D went end-of-production years ago now, but I think you can still find sets on Amazon and ebay. However, you're probably better off going for something newer in their line.

And stay the fuck away from the Mobius. At the same time however, the Audeze LCD-GX is based on their universally well-received LCD reference series featuring planar drivers, and so is probably one of the best listening experiences you can get. But it's stupidly expensive at $899.

The Mobius has planar drivers too, albeit smaller than those found in the LCD series, and while the experience of using the headset is lousy, I can vouch for the quality of the sound. One thing that certainly isn't confirmation bias is how the audio stays crystal clear at high volumes, not distorting at all. So much so, there's hearing health warnings that come with Audeze gear. Because the audio doesn't distort, it's harder for the user to recognise when the volume is dangerously high.

Edit: Oh yeah, and the major problem I had with the Mobius was that periodically, the onboard surround processing would fuck up, resulting in nasty phasing on the rear channels in 7.1 mode that wouldn't go away even through restoring factory defaults.
From my experience I would say that while Audeze are great at making actual headphones, they're shit at the processing electronics.
Oh, and after a couple of months, the USB-C port used to connect it to the PC developed a dry joint, resulting in the audio cutting out mid-game. Really fucking stupid decision to have all that hardware on-board instead of external to the headphone. They should have stuck with a normal 3.5mm jack setup going to a USB soundcard.
They used USB-C because it needed that bandwidth for the 7.1 audio. But as 7.1 wasn't available in Bluetooth or 3.5mm connected mode, it was really fucking pointless having that processing done on the headphone.
Don Carlos
Posts: 17508
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Don Carlos »

Mat Linnett wrote:I went for a full-on audiophile quality set last year, buying the Audeze Mobius, but was massively disappointed with my purchase.
In trying to squeeze as many features as possible in to the headset, they ended up producing a heavy and user-unfriendly headphone.

Admittedly, the sound was pretty good, but in hindsight, even that may have been partially confirmation bias.

So I ended up going back to my trusty old Sennheiser PC 363D, and it made me completely appreciate it anew. It's light, the sound quality is excellent, and it's no-nonsense. I don't have to do any set-up before playing a game or anything. Yeah, you have to install a driver for the USB soundcard it comes with, but that's once-and-done.
With the Mobius, because all the processing hardware was on-board, I had to remember to reset my recording device in Windows every time I powered it on.

If I buy another headset any time soon, I'll probably look at getting the Sennheiser GSX-1000 gaming headphone amplifier, an audiophile-quality normal headphone and an in-line boom mic like this V-MODA one.
Speaking of V-MODA, my commute headphone is the V-MODA Crossfade M100.
I used to use a Sennheiser HD25 II (the choice of DJs and post production audio suite operators worldwide), but there's a manufacturing flaw with them where you end up having to replace the main cable frequently.
The V-MODA set is excellent and incredibly well-built, folding away in to a neat little hard clamshell case for transport. The main cable is fully detachable from the headphone itself, and there's a good amount of metal used in the construction, meaning it feels noticeably sturdier than a lot of headphones out there at the same price-point.

I also bought the Astro A40 back in the day as well, but that's nowhere near as good as Sennheiser sets in my experience. Maybe the newer kit's good.

So my takeaway would be, for a gaming headset, you can't beat Sennheiser's stuff, and if you then want to take things a bit more seriously, look at the in-line boom mic, headphone amp and a quality stereo headphone.
I would say if you want to just buy a gaming headset, look to spend around £200 for a really good one.
My PC 363D went end-of-production years ago now, but I think you can still find sets on Amazon and ebay. However, you're probably better off going for something newer in their line.

And stay the fuck away from the Mobius. At the same time however, the Audeze LCD-GX is based on their universally well-received LCD reference series featuring planar drivers, and so is probably one of the best listening experiences you can get. But it's stupidly expensive at $899.

The Mobius has planar drivers too, albeit smaller than those found in the LCD series, and while the experience of using the headset is lousy, I can vouch for the quality of the sound. One thing that certainly isn't confirmation bias is how the audio stays crystal clear at high volumes, not distorting at all. So much so, there's hearing health warnings that come with Audeze gear. Because the audio doesn't distort, it's harder for the user to recognise when the volume is dangerously high.

Edit: Oh yeah, and the major problem I had with the Mobius was that periodically, the onboard surround processing would fuck up, resulting in nasty phasing on the rear channels in 7.1 mode that wouldn't go away even through restoring factory defaults.
From my experience I would say that while Audeze are great at making actual headphones, they're shit at the processing electronics.
Oh, and after a couple of months, the USB-C port used to connect it to the PC developed a dry joint, resulting in the audio cutting out mid-game. Really fucking stupid decision to have all that hardware on-board instead of external to the headphone. They should have stuck with a normal 3.5mm jack setup going to a USB soundcard.
They used USB-C because it needed that bandwidth for the 7.1 audio. But as 7.1 wasn't available in Bluetooth or 3.5mm connected mode, it was really fucking pointless having that processing done on the headphone.
oooohhh this is very useful as Mobius were in the range I was looking at. This has put me right off that idea to be honest.

This is what else I have been looking at, high end audio wise: https://steelseries.com/gaming-headsets ... olor=white

So far these appear to be clear winners from nearly all of the reviews I have read and watched.
Don Carlos
Posts: 17508
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Don Carlos »

shaft wrote:Audeze Mobius or the cheaper hyperX cloud orbit variant without the head tracking.
Sorry breh; given Mr Linnett's review, I will not be in a rush to spunk out top dollar on the Mobius
User avatar
shaft
Posts: 12473
Joined: Fri Dec 10, 1999 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by shaft »

fair enough.
I've been using them for 6mo and the only issue I ran across was the phasing and was able to reset them by switching to bluetooth and back. I had the Sennhieser GSX 1000 and Game Zero's before I bought the Mobius and I would consider it a clear upgrade in audio quality and surround virtualization. I also find them just as comfortable but that's completely subjective since everyone's head is different.
YourGrandpa
Posts: 10074
Joined: Mon Apr 17, 2000 7:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by YourGrandpa »

I've got a Set of HyperX USB 7.1's that I really like. Sound great and solid quality.
Doombrain
Posts: 23226
Joined: Sat Aug 12, 2000 7:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Doombrain »

Steelseires all the way
User avatar
vesp
Posts: 1337
Joined: Thu Mar 23, 2000 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by vesp »

I'd say this thread makes me feel old if I didn't know you lot were even crustier than me ! I haven't had regular gaming folks that I'd want to chat with for years now :/
I just use my koss portapros for pretty much everything, but they're not mic'd up for gaming.

Do find it amusing that this is one of the glamour shots for those headphones, looks like he's just been pumped :D
[lvlshot]https://media.steelseriescdn.com/thumbs/filer_public/36/56/365621f2-d0a2-4259-bc72-a936d5d2a492/apro-wireless_buy_001.jpg__1850x800_q100_crop-scale_optimize_subsampling-2.jpg[/lvlshot]
Turbanator
Posts: 883
Joined: Wed Jun 08, 1983 7:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Turbanator »

Don Carlos wrote:This is what else I have been looking at, high end audio wise: https://steelseries.com/gaming-headsets ... olor=white

So far these appear to be clear winners from nearly all of the reviews I have read and watched.
I bought these recently, great audio, but buggy with PS4 rest mode (microphone drops when returning from rest). Great when they work normally!

https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... e_in_rest/
https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... ing_up_on/
User avatar
Whiskey 7
Posts: 9697
Joined: Sat Jul 21, 2001 7:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Whiskey 7 »

Turbanator, been too long. WB :D
[color=#FFBF00]Physicist [/color][color=#FF4000]of[/color] [color=#0000FF]Q3W[/color]
User avatar
Eraser
Posts: 19168
Joined: Fri Dec 01, 2000 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Eraser »

Turbanator wrote:
Don Carlos wrote:This is what else I have been looking at, high end audio wise: https://steelseries.com/gaming-headsets ... olor=white

So far these appear to be clear winners from nearly all of the reviews I have read and watched.
I bought these recently, great audio, but buggy with PS4 rest mode (microphone drops when returning from rest). Great when they work normally!

https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... e_in_rest/
https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... ing_up_on/
Care to explain yourself, young man? Where have you been hanging out? It's been THREE YEARS we've been waiting here for you.
You know what this means. Curfew for you and no more beer or dancing girls!
User avatar
MKJ
Posts: 32579
Joined: Fri Nov 24, 2000 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by MKJ »

girls? This is Turb youre talking to
User avatar
Eraser
Posts: 19168
Joined: Fri Dec 01, 2000 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Eraser »

Not even morbidly obese ones, then? :paranoid:
Don Carlos
Posts: 17508
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Don Carlos »

Turbanator wrote:
Don Carlos wrote:This is what else I have been looking at, high end audio wise: https://steelseries.com/gaming-headsets ... olor=white

So far these appear to be clear winners from nearly all of the reviews I have read and watched.
I bought these recently, great audio, but buggy with PS4 rest mode (microphone drops when returning from rest). Great when they work normally!

https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... e_in_rest/
https://www.reddit.com/r/steelseries/co ... ing_up_on/
Given they will be used for the PC, I dont foresee this being an issue for me. Thanks for the heads up though breh :up:
Turbanator
Posts: 883
Joined: Wed Jun 08, 1983 7:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Turbanator »

Hello all :)

I just swung by to see if people were still alive :D Due to lockdown, I've been gaming a bit recently, so it made me think of this place.

How is everyone?
xer0s
Posts: 12446
Joined: Sat Feb 10, 2001 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by xer0s »

This is a headset thread. Try to stay on topic, newb...
User avatar
Captain
Posts: 20410
Joined: Thu Jan 05, 2006 2:50 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Captain »

Who is this rookie
User avatar
MKJ
Posts: 32579
Joined: Fri Nov 24, 2000 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by MKJ »

No Rook is the other guy.
User avatar
Mat Linnett
Posts: 2477
Joined: Wed Apr 12, 2000 7:00 am
Location: The Grizzly Grotto

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Mat Linnett »

So yeah, I got a decent discount on the Audeze LCD-GX recently, so thought I might as well try them out.

Long story short?

They're going back, and I'm never buying another Audeze product ever again.


To extrapolate:
I probably should have learned my lesson from the Mobius, but naïvely, I figured that a headset at the cost of the LCD-GX must be good.
Oh, how wrong I was.
The presentation is spectacular, and the headset comes in a peli-style case, with multiple cable options. But it goes down-hill from there.

Picking them up, while they don't have the internal electronics of the Mobius, they're still suspiciously heavy.
Putting them on, the supposedly memory foam earcups sit uncomfortably over your ears, and the suspension headstrap shows the critical ergonomic flaw of the headset. There's not enough clearance between the strap and the spring fucking steel headband, meaning that with the increased weight, it digs in to your head.

And to finish it off, the sound quality isn't noticeably any better than my trusty old Sennheiser 363D.

So moving forward, I reckon I'm going to continue using and repairing my 363D.
I reckon I lucked out with that headset, and will stop experimenting with others.
I'll use them until they break irreversibly, and if I can find another set online, I'll snap it up immediately.

I've already bought a spare set of earcups and a spare headband pad, and added velcro to those pads so they can be easily swapped out and washed, and I just need to look at repairing the volume pot on the right cup, as if I turn the volume all the way up, the right cup cuts out. But dialling it back a tiny amount brings it back.

For a 9 year old headset, it's still doing sterling service and is certainly the most comfortable headset I've ever owned.

Oh, and I did end up buying the GSX-1000, and the 363D works excellently with it. It's what I used to drive the LCD-GX too. That's been a really good investment, and it even works flawlessly with Linux (which I've moved to at home as my main OS).
User avatar
Κracus
Posts: 5969
Joined: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:38 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Κracus »

People here seem fairly more knowledgeable than myself but I gotta say, I've owned this Turtle Beach Stealth 600 headset now since 2015 and it hasn't let me down yet. Good sound and I can wear it all day. Except maybe hot summer days, those days are too hot for ear muffs. Otherwise no complaints, I do have to run updates on em once in a while. I'll probably buy another turtle beach headset when I get a new set. I just can't part with these.

https://ca.turtlebeach.com/collections/ ... -600-gen-2
User avatar
Mat Linnett
Posts: 2477
Joined: Wed Apr 12, 2000 7:00 am
Location: The Grizzly Grotto

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Mat Linnett »

Yeah, I hear good stuff about Turtle Beach Kracus, though I've never had a set myself.
But critically, you hit on the most important part: you're happy with them.

My main grievance with gaming headsets is that they've been over-commodified.
With normal, music-focussed headsets, you generally don't see a high turnover on headsets. A manufacturer makes a model, and you can buy that model (or spares for it) forever. See Sennheiser's popular DJ headphones, the HD-25.
But even though my 363Ds are almost perfect for me, I can't buy a replacement headset, and spares are limited, thanks to it going out of production.

And headphones are tuned differently for different purposes, so a set of cans designed for listening to music isn't necessarily going to be the best for gaming and vice versa.

Dunno, I may try some dedicated audio headphones for gaming, see if there's really that much of a difference, or if it can be offset by the GSX-1000.
User avatar
Κracus
Posts: 5969
Joined: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:38 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Κracus »

I don't know about the audio headsets but mine has things like an option to boost the sounds of background noises in games, like footsteps for example making them easier to hear. You can also control the game volume vs mic/chat volume independently so you can find a good balance between game sound and voice chat/party chat without fiddling with in game settings. It has a few other game related sound settings you can toggle on and off at the press of a button all on the headset.
xer0s
Posts: 12446
Joined: Sat Feb 10, 2001 8:00 am

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by xer0s »

lol, Turb really got zero love in this thread…
User avatar
Foo
Posts: 13836
Joined: Thu Aug 03, 2000 7:00 am
Location: New Zealand

Re: Gaming headsets

Post by Foo »

For PC gaming I've been really happy with the Logitech Pro X wireless. To the point that when the wife wanted a headset for Fortnite, we just bought another set of the same. I hear the Steelseries arctis pro wireless is also fantastic, but I have not tried it out.

Before that she'd been using the Phillips X2HR, but lack of mic, presence of a cord, and the weight of the set for multiple hours were all problems. Likewise I had been using Beyerdynamic 880DTs. Great sound, but all the same issues with cords and no mic. Closed back is definitely better for gaming, but worse for general listening. I don't think there's a perfect do-it-all solution, so I've stopped trying to find that now and just accept running two different setups for each purpose.
Post Reply