Help with headphones for gaming thats not a naff headset

CraigN

CraigN

CraigN

Soldato
Joined
30 Jul 2005
Posts
3,096
Location
Bristol
Hi All,

I have used a corsair wireless headset for going on 5 years. Plastics have broken multiple times and it has been replaced by them. The mic is poor and i now use an external mic which im happy with.

I need ideas on what headphones to get. I would love them to be wireless but it seems this really limits my options. Wired headphones would be plugged into my on board sound card if i went down the 3.5mm jack route or USB if that route.

I have tried my Bose Bluetooth in ear and some Sennheiser momentum Bluetooth headphones with my rig and it seems the motherboard on board Bluetooth simply does not support the bluetooth profile these use.

I know nothing about headphones other than the fact the Dr Dre beats my wife bought me are trash. I dislike plastic that feels cheap. I will use these solely for gaming.

any suggestions greatly appreciated.
 
What's your budget? I just received the Fidelio X2 today and they sound amazing. Had a couple of games of CS and PUBG already and was able to pinpoint footsteps with ease. They also sound incredible for music too though, had them plugged into my phone and listened to some flac tracks and they sound so clear, and they go loud enough just being plugged straight into the phone.
I'm sure you would feel confident in the build quality, they are totally solid and feel like a premium quality product. No cheap plastic anywhere. They are also incredibly comfy to wear, definitely the comfiest I've ever worn. I just returned the HifiMan HE400i yesterday because they were faulty, and I wasn't really impressed with the build quality, even though they did sound good. But I'm now really glad they were faulty and I got these instead, because these just seem SOLID.
 
Willing to go upto £300 if I’m convinced they will last we a good few years.

My motherboard is an ASUS Rampage 6 extreme.

Will have a look at the fidelio x2

Ta
 
CraigN said:
I have used a corsair wireless headset for going on 5 years. Plastics have broken multiple times and it has been replaced by them.

I need ideas on what headphones to get. I would love them to be wireless but it seems this really limits my options....
Click to expand...
Sounds like better service than with Sennheiser:
Neither Sennheiser Nordic or main department in Germany even answered to my emails, when I commented plastic of HD595 (having cost 200€) breaking in 2½ years...
(known failure point of bad design so I guess their policy was not answering)

Bluetooth has bandwidth problems for keeping high audio signal quality, so better to forget it.
And it needs BT receiver, D/A-converter and amplifier from headphones themselves, which need their own budget on top of that of standard headphone parts.
Also wireless stuff usually has proprietary battery, which might not be even meant to be replaced.
Though Sennheiser's wireless headphones actually use standard AAA-rechargeables.
And same extra component and design cost needs applies also to other wireless headphones.

Anyway do you have quiet or noisy environment?
If there's no need for isolating external noises open headphones are better.


CraigN said:
Willing to go upto £300 if I’m convinced they will last we a good few years.
Click to expand...
Only few years?
You should demand 10+ years!
Because that's what properly designed headphones can survive... except for ear pads which wear from use.

Assuming you want good fun bass very similar to Philips Fidelio sound Beyerdynamic DT990 is good for durability with its design done in time when durability was thing of honour.
Just month ago in Finnish PC forum one person was looking if there are any open design wireless headphones with sound quality in similar class to his 89 vintage DT990.
Beyerdynamic's ear pads are rather cheap and easily available +also other spare parts (unlike for Philips) so DT990 is easy to keep going for long time.

That budget would also fit AKG K712 which has even better soundstage for binaural gaming at small expense of bass feel.
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/t...eyerdynamic-dt990-gaming-comparison.18804749/
Though design is lot more complex than in Beyerdynamic, in which replacing most parts would be very simple.

Also for truly shining these headphones need binaural sound.
And with Asus hyping their Sonic Radar graphical overlay for showing sound directions no sure if that Sonic Studio gives proper soudn for headphones.
 
interesting read.

would i also need some form of DAC or amplifier for such headphones? Is there an idiots guide to what the different ohm versions mean?
 
Beyerdynamic's DT770-990 serie was designed 30 years ago with durable design, in which user can replace all parts easily with couple basic tools.
Fair month ago when replacing pads opened my five years old DT990 all the way to driver to check diaphragm for pieces of hair.
Whole ear cup has literally only one part (besides ear pad) to remove for getting part holding driver out from cup.
While having faster to replace ear pads AKG is definitely less user friendly for any maintenance beyond that:
http://cloud.akg.com/9352/k612pro_k712pro_service.pdf


DAC (D/A converter) is just fashion name for selling less features as more.
Sound cards have lots of other features besides just of DAC.
Also every output has some kind amplifier in it because DAC itself can't drive any load.
While harder decades ago with modern ICs and opamps it doesn't take special parts to make headphone output good for most headphones:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/high-end-pc-audio,3733-19.html

Though there are very real electric engineering reasons for some headphones not being good for all outputs and vice versa.
Like high output impedance which can mess frequency response and wreck damping factor of low impedance headphones.
Or output simply having too low operating voltage (like in battery powered device) to have adequate volume.
But even integrated Realteks output enough voltage for getting to hearing dangerous sound pressure with 250 ohm Beyers.
Because impedance doesn't tell about how much power is needed per dB and Beyers are average in that.


But headphone gaming is about lot more than just converting stereo signal to analog form and driving headphones.
Because human has only two "mics/receivers" it's possible to have 3D sound with just two channels.
In real world such 3D sound can be recorded by simply having microphones in "dummy" head. (or special mics which are worn like IEMs)
That records time delays and other changes in sound signal when sound waves travel to ears.
Then you just need good headphones to have very nice real world like immersion:
http://berkeleybside.com/sound-dimensions-of-binaural-recording/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpNtNCqP94g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epf1QxuHJv8

We can't put dummy head with mics into game, so in those binaural sound needs to be simulated mathematically from surround/5.1 sound produced by game.
But with actually good headphones it gives very good sense of direction and even depth/distance.
Realteks lack proper binaural simulation and fashion DACs have even less being only two channel stereo devices.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1_20T8x_OI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8xZp0WPwxs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHhwUT4BYMk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iA0_6ZvhFo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGwvDmUwFcg

Binaural sound just has very specific and lot harder requirements than any stereo music.
So average headphones aren't very good for it and especially closed headphones have huge challenges in soundstage.
Typical cheap closed headphones are especially bad.
And headphones being open and acknowledged for music doesn't mean them being especially good for gaming.
Binaural sound simply doesn't like any "smoothed"/rolled off trebles or smaller more intimate soundstage etc.

As example total garbage sound headphones can have very agressive "front row" feel in music with lots of bass.
But with those binaural game vids it feels like you have head in bucket... underwater:
As in having no depth/distance sense with some sounds just being more muffled than others and also directions being vague.



Sound Blaster Z has very good features for its price and would work well with 250ohm Beyers insensitive to output impedance.
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/search?ssearch=sound+blaster+z
while fidelios with their fashionable very low impedance would suffer decrease in damping factor.
akgs would fare better.

above that there's newer sound blasterx ae-5 with top level dac chip and about the best headphone output of sound cards with very low output impedance.
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/crea...-5-black-rgb-gaming-sound-card-sc-104-cl.html
 
CraigN said:
interesting read.

would i also need some form of DAC or amplifier for such headphones? Is there an idiots guide to what the different ohm versions mean?
Click to expand...
any half decent sound card & Headphones will be half decent or Good for gaming.
The above poster Always just goes overboard on detail & goes around the point you actually want answered. then you read it back & you can read it 400 different ways.

As a simple example

You could go with somethinglike
Sound card
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/crea...-5-black-rgb-gaming-sound-card-sc-104-cl.html

Headphones
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/akg-k712-pro-reference-studio-headphones-sp-004-ak.html

mic if needed:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/antl...i-directional-omni-directional-sp-047-al.html


That way if you want Decent sound you got it & if you want to use the "virtual 3D" i'm over here trickiery (which can sound horrid to ok) then you can too which a click of a switch


You could go the Amp/DAC route, but you would lose the option for Virtual Trickery. Something im not fond of

the other thought to have is if you have a spare PCI-E slot or lanes to use in your PC :)
 
I just got some AKG 702( and mod mic) with an Asus Xonar U7 II usb card and the sound quality is great. However they are not very loud and dont have much bass. Great for gaming though.
 
^ yeh K702 is decent used to have it myself the issue i had was i used to break the AKG string clips when i put them. on as i only had one hand to put them on. so over time they broke off
 
MMX 300 without a shadow of a doubt.

I got some for Xmas, and they're really lovely cans with a fantastic mic.

A certain auction website has them available for 100 quid.
 
thanks guys for the help.

I use an external condenser mic on a boom arm anyways its just a cheapy rainforest setup but works so much better than a headset mic or the USB samson jobby i had before.

I have ordered some Bayer Dynamics DT 990 Premium 32ohm versions. Will see how they sound with the onboard realtek. I have plenty of room in my case if i need more power i would much rather a soundcard over an external box.

Will let you know how i get on with them when they arrive next week.

ta
 
CraigN said:
thanks guys for the help.

I use an external condenser mic on a boom arm anyways its just a cheapy rainforest setup but works so much better than a headset mic or the USB samson jobby i had before.

I have ordered some Bayer Dynamics DT 990 Premium 32ohm versions. Will see how they sound with the onboard realtek. I have plenty of room in my case if i need more power i would much rather a soundcard over an external box.

Will let you know how i get on with them when they arrive next week.

ta
Click to expand...
no problem,

the realtek onboard will sound decent but Any half decent soundcard will bring out stuff you wont hear on realtek in my experience. hope you enjoy either way! :)
 
not used the K712 i liked the K702 quite a bit

i think the worst parts of the K702 were
the head band can hurt the top of your had (the lumpy bits) they soften over time but they can hurt at first if too tight.
the clips of the strings broke off for me over time if you do not put them on with two hands.

sounds was very good though. Not used the K712s soo...
 
The K712 looks like a horrid gaming headset. His description on the consumer sound I found quite off putting. Which is steering me to the K702.
 
smogsy said:
i think the worst parts of the K702 were
the head band can hurt the top of your had (the lumpy bits) they soften over time but they can hurt at first if too tight.
Click to expand...
That was indeed really weird design choise I wondered from the first time of seeing picture of those.
Also one odd number of bumps version even had single bumb directly in top center.

And took many years to discard.
Though those couple years old second hand K702s I got are with smooth head band.
(also asked that before buying them)


V F said:
The K712 looks like a horrid gaming headset. His description on the consumer sound I found quite off putting. Which is steering me to the K702.
Click to expand...
K712 has heavy bass only if comparison point is some ATH-AD700 with as much bass as tin can.
And soundstage definitely hasn't suffered really any from it.
Foot steps and such sounds just aren't so pronounced and forward pushed as in K702.


DT990 has little more bass feel and smaller soundstage than K712.
And even some famous for music HD650 would be lot behind DT990:
The DT990 destroys the HD650 in both depth and width. So how's the air within the soundstage? Well, the problem with the HD650, is that it's a very full sounding headphone. Thick, warm tone tends to make the soundstage seems less airy and smaller.
Positioning and soundstage tend to go hand in hand, so if the soundstage isn't great, the positional cues will suffer. How did the HD650 fare positional-wise? Well, they were good. Not great, and could obviously be better, but they do their job.​
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/mad...-11-10-2017-sennheiser-game-one-added.534479/
 
Last edited:
definitely get fidelio x1 if can still source or x2 nothing touches them for soundstage and slam for gaming / movies
 
C64 said:
definitely get fidelio x1 if can still source or x2 nothing touches them for soundstage and slam for gaming / movies
Click to expand...

I second getting an X2/X2HR. Seems to be the best headphone for having both good wide soundstage and a nice musical quality. Wouldn't bother with the X1 though (although I do think they're hard to find anyway), X2 made many improvements to the X1 with regards to the build and comfort.
 
K712 is a better all rounder than the X2. I have owned both, but neither anymore.

K712 has a wider soundstage, miles more detail and the bass is not tubby.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom