Customer Reviews
Superb headset in every way
I've owned a few headsets in the past 10 years, including Logitech, Altec Lansing, Sony (without a microphone) and a lower model Sennheiser about 5 years ago. I am an avid computer gamer and often go late into the night at stretches of 8 hours at a time or more. And this is the best headset I've ever used in almost everyway.
First impressions on removing it from the packaging (which I had no trouble with, following the directions on the box) were of durability and a solid build. It's well put together, nothing seems flimsy or cheap, but its also surprisingly lightweight. The wire is quite heavy duty, unlike the Altec Lansing and Logitech headsets I previously owned. Not to mention robust strain relief where the wire connects to the headset, the control pod, and the jacks.
The control pod is perfectly positioned and lightweight, so even if it's dangling you don't even feel it, unlike the bulky control pods on some other headsets. In terms of fit, the ears swivel almost 45 degrees in each direction, and extend from the head-bar with solid clicking intervals. The headbar and ears are both covered in comfortable velor padding which unlike faux-leather on my previous altec lansings, don't cause your skin to sweat and stick to it. The earpieces swivel slightly in and out, and if you push firmly on them they will collapse inward with a snap - don't be afraid, it just prevents them from collapsing on accident, which I was concerned about when I saw them folded inward in the pictures.
They collapse solidly but will not do so by themselves. The microphone is adjustable, but not overly so - you have to bend it firmly to adjust the position and it won't bounce back on its own. It descends down from its perch vertically along the headset with a moderate degree of resistance, so it won't flop up or down on its own. And if you want to move it halfway up and leave it there, it won't flop back down, unlike my old headset, which either had to be all the way up or down. Hopefully it stays this way.
In terms of comfort, its extraordinary. Many headsets I've owned claimed to be circumaural, meaning they surround you ears and don't sit on them or in them. But most either never intended to actually follow through on that promise or they are made for people with ears the size of quarters. Even my old Sennheisers sat right on my ears, and my Altec Lansings, while a very nice headset, had padding large enough to go around my ears, but the speakers inside the earphones themselves pressed up against my ears, which became extremely uncomfortable after periods of time.
These earphones are ACTUALLY circumaural. The padding surrounds your ears but never touches them. The only pressure is on your actual head; your ears are never in contact with anything. The velor is soft and the pressure is almost unnoticeable. At first they seemed a bit tight but a little adjustment of the head-bar and a couple hours and they seem to break in a bit. the velor padding on the head-bar rests gently on the top of your head and the whole thing seems to distribute the weight of the headset evenly so you barely feel it.
Now for sound - Everyone knows Sennheiser is one of the premier names in sound quality, and these are no disappointment. Now these are probably not the headset you want if you're just listening to music in a studio or something - but for a combination of a microphone and comfort and audio quality, I doubt there's any better at this price. I began by watching a DVD of Band of Brothers on my computer. At first I thought something was wrong! It sounded like there was some kind of noise coming from somewhere else besides the DVD, when I realized I was hearing things I've never even before heard on my speaker system!
Every sound, especially the mid's and high's are exceptionally clear and sharp. And for a headset that is not a 5.1 headset, the directionality of the sound is amazing. Some here have complained that the base is not heavy enough, but honestly, if you want to have more base than this, you're not looking for audio quality and accuracy, you're just looking for ridiculous base. The base was excellent and sharp, not booming or echoing. Explosions sounded realistic and surprising, without any buzzing or crackling. For sound quality, these are better than my Klipsch Promedia speaker system, and that's saying something.
These also have a closed headset design, and I was initially worried about the sweaty-ear syndrome from this type of headset, but I was suprised and happy to find that after 4 hours, I didn't experience any overheating or sweating of my ears. Maybe in the summertime that would change, but if anything the headset just got more comfortable over that time.
The microphone quality, while it is hard for me to tell myself, I've been told it's excellent, although I had to turn my gain up a bit on my microphone, because apparently its a bit quieter because of the filter on it.
My only con with this set of headphones is the cord I think could be a bit longer, but that's not a big deal, for me anyways. Also, I think a carrying bag might be nice to go with these headphones.
Overall, if you're looking for a headset with superb audio quality, comfort, durability, longevity, and a high quality microphone, not to mention incredibly stylish looks and a classic and understated appearance, you CANNOT go wrong with these for the price. Forget the 5.1 channel headsets with bulky, powered control pods for surround sound and brightly colored headsets, get this one for a lifetime of quality and enjoyment.
Best pair of headphones I have ever owned
Got this set in today and I must say for a $250 dollar headset it comes with very little extras(no 1/4 adapter etcc..)All you get is the headset.
Pros:
-The sound is amazing. This is the first headset that after playing with the EQ settings you can actually get these bad boys to vibrate pretty hard from the bass with no distortion. In fact I can turn everything all the way up and get no distortion.
-The mic is great no reverb and the inline mute works well
-Closed design really does eliminate outside noise for the most part.I would say about 80 percent or so.
-Build quality is amazing
-very comfortable
-And I must say this headset is pretty
Cons:
-The inline volume is almost useless. If you turn it all the way down it doesnt go mute or even close to it I would say all the way down on the little wheel thing is 50 percent volume and of course all the way up on the wheel is 100 percent.I am not sure if mine is defective or maybee thats the way high end phones are.I use the PC volume anyway so it doesnt bother me too much.
Overall I love them and if it werent for the volume wheel I would have gave it 5 stars.
Best Headset Ever
I was the happy owner of a sennheiser 161 for like 2 years, it died because I had the bad habbit of chewing on the string when I got stressed programming. I gotta say this thing is far superior, I was worried it'd be expensive just because it looks a lot nicer and would not be much of an improvement over sennheisers $70 - 100 headsets. I was very impressed when they got here. The audio quality is not super improved from the older headsets, that's not a insult though as the cheaper ones have amazing quality. It has much more capacity for bass. The cheaper headsets sounded really bad on heavy bass parts. A lot of people think a better headset will make the bass louder or more noticeable at least, but its not the case unless you use an equalizer.
PROS:
The best change in my opinion is the microphone. The mics on the cheaper models were great, but this one has AMAZING noise reduction.
The next best thing is the ambient noise reduction. I honestly felt like the ear pieces were like suction cups because you can feel a noticable change in pressure when you put them on and your voice even sounds different to you when you speak. It's not exactly like ear plugs but there's definitely a noticeable drop in ambient noise.
The privacy is pretty good. People can't hear what your listening to when they're on your head, however the second you take them off its pretty loud even at low volumes.
More bass capacity.
More comfortable and nicer looking.
The wire is noticeably thicker...for me to chew on =P
Cons
Still the same cheap manual wheel to increase or lower volume. From experience these seem to break easily or cause one side of the headset to be louder than the other on certain levels.
It produces a crackling sound at 98Khz output sampling rate on my soundcard. I set it to 48Khz and it fixed the issue. Other headsets didn't have this problem.
It gets kinda hot around the ears.
One of the previous reviewers noted that the volume wheel sucks and won't turn the sound all the way off. I gotta say it makes it really quiet. If you want to mute the sound all together you can just set a hotkey with hotkeybind, autohotkey or some other free macro software.
