[Androidisgimp]

Email from Hifiheadphones I got yesterday after asking if they had an update.

“Thank you for your email, sadly not. The last update we had was Audeze are hoping to ship to us this week, and we are hoping to start shipping to customers some time next week.
With best regards,
Oscar (AKA the Headphone Guru)”

 

[WhiteHartMart]

Email from Hifiheadphones I got yesterday after asking if they had an update.

“Thank you for your email, sadly not. The last update we had was Audeze are hoping to ship to us this week, and we are hoping to start shipping to customers some time next week.
With best regards,
Oscar (AKA the Headphone Guru)”

Arghhh, darn it - it was wishful thinking I guess.

Hmm - debating just cancelling my order then and getting from Amazon.fr or is that me being too impatient!!

**Update
Hifiheadphones just emailed today to say:-

'Thank you for your email, stock is shipping from Audeze this week, and we hope to start shipping to customers next week.'

Call me pessimistic (and at least the shipping from Audeze is more than just a hope now (I think??)) but the 'hope to start shipping to customers next week' doesn't fill me with confidence?

 

[CommunistWitchDr]

If the wireless component was "by any objective measure beyond the limits of human hearing" why wouldn't everyone offer it?

They DO. The Arctis Pro, which allows for chatmix on PC, uses lossless wireless. You can't get better than lossless. The lower sound quality has nothing to do with the wireless chipset. Anyone can find out this product exists with chatmix in a minute on Google and find out how they do it, presenting two devices to the host OS, in another five. So I reiterate that it's absolutely ridiculous Audeze couldn't find this out themselves and implement the same solution to ensure chatmix on all platforms.

They’ve made a $300 headset and you think it’s more likely they cut corners to save a couple of bucks on the wireless chipset compared with $130 headsets, than that they chose a specific chipset because it has other advantages? Seems unlikely to me, but who knows.

Seeing as the competition has lossless chipsets that support chatmix at the same price point, the cheaper Arctis are not lossless while the ~$300 Pro is, I'm 100% certain there are no measurable sound quality differences resulting from the wireless implementation and it's all in the rest of the headphones. So the remaining options are
A: Failure to do market research and realize a solution exists
B: Cost cutting to sell a $300 headset instead of a $400 headset

 

[KMann]

I would consider it extraordinarily unlikely that the final reason was anything but cost or complete lack of researching how their competition implemented chatmix solutions. If that chipset really does sound better, and it's already a stretch to say the wireless componet, which by any objective measure should be beyond the limits of human hearing, is the limiting factor in other headsets rather than the obviously lacking drivers, they could still have had it present as two devices and allow universal chatmix by simply doubling up on them in the dongle.

This is purely speculative and incorrect. The choice of wireless chipset has nothing to do with the ability to do game-chat mix. It was a design decision based on design complexity and time and the fact that PC and Mac platforms have feature rich software solutions to accomplish the same, trying to accomplish the same in hardware too makes little sense from the perspective of keeping things simple. To do game-chat mix the Dongle would have to appear as two USB devices with additional chipset to accomplish the mixing and software to control the same. But this method has it's own share of issues when having to support non Windows platforms. Xbox already supports game-chat mix, we will support it on PS5 when the feature is enable via USB.

 

[CommunistWitchDr]

But this method has it's own share of issues when having to support non Windows platforms.

How is it, then, that the Arctis headphones with hardware chatmix support every single platform the Penrose supports without exception? Clearly it isn't impossible for support for all platforms and hardware chatmix to coexist or someone else couldn't have already done it.

Not to mention the absolute absurdity of relying on client side software versus a hardware solution for more compatibility. I could use Chatmix on the Arctis with Haiku OS or FreeBSD if I wanted because the hardware implementation grants a truly platform independent interface. The same can't be said for a software solution.

and software to control the same

Factually incorrect. Firmware, maybe, but not software. With it presented as two audio devices I can plug it in to a Windows or Linux pc with no Arctis software installed and have it work perfectly by just selecting the output device for the programs I desire to classify as games or as chat with the systems built in mixer.

 

[astrothundr]

@KMann I don't think I've seen this clarified yet so I'll ask again. Would it be possible to enable adjusting volume individually for 2.4ghz wireless and bluetooth when using both simultaneously?

 

[Androidisgimp]

Arghhh, darn it - it was wishful thinking I guess.

Hmm - debating just cancelling my order then and getting from Amazon.fr or is that me being too impatient!!

**Update
Hifiheadphones just emailed today to say:-

'Thank you for your email, stock is shipping from Audeze this week, and we hope to start shipping to customers next week.'

Call me pessimistic (and at least the shipping form Audeze is more than just a hope now) but the 'hope to start shipping to customers next week' doesn't fill me with confidence?

yes that’s all they say. ‘We hope’
I’ve no idea why I haven’t cancelled these yet TBH.

 

[KMann]

@KMann I don't think I've seen this clarified yet so I'll ask again. Would it be possible to enable adjusting volume individually for 2.4ghz wireless and bluetooth when using both simultaneously?

No it cannot be done through Penrose, but you may be able to accomplish something similar by changing the volume of the sources

 

[brownvim]

I hope hifiheadphones get a batch of the replacement ear pads too, I don’t like the blue.

https://www.hifiheadphones.co.uk/pr...eadphones-carbon?_pos=54&_sid=25b9114e9&_ss=r

 

[gmdoom]

Arghhh, darn it - it was wishful thinking I guess.

Hmm - debating just cancelling my order then and getting from Amazon.fr or is that me being too impatient!!

**Update
Hifiheadphones just emailed today to say:-

'Thank you for your email, stock is shipping from Audeze this week, and we hope to start shipping to customers next week.'

Call me pessimistic (and at least the shipping from Audeze is more than just a hope now (I think??)) but the 'hope to start shipping to customers next week' doesn't fill me with confidence?

I thought Audeze had said they’ve already shipped to their retailers now. As next week comes I’ll need to decide to cancel as I’m away most of December and not at home so will decide on something else

 

[lippi]

I thought Audeze had said they’ve already shipped to their retailers now. As next week comes I’ll need to decide to cancel as I’m away most of December and not at home so will decide on something else

Sounds like hifiheadphones are literally the last retailer to be recieving these. I hope they send out quickly and with fast delivery when they get them

 

[amoeba1126]

How is it, then, that the Arctis headphones with hardware chatmix support every single platform the Penrose supports without exception? Clearly it isn't impossible for support for all platforms and hardware chatmix to coexist or someone else couldn't have already done it.

Factually incorrect. Firmware, maybe, but not software. With it presented as two audio devices I can plug it in to a Windows or Linux pc with no Arctis software installed and have it work perfectly by just selecting the output device for the programs I desire to classify as games or as chat with the systems built in mixer.

1. They never said it was impossible, they said they made a design decision not to in order to keep things as simple as possible across all platforms
2. Hate to be that guy, but firmware IS software, specifically firmware is software loaded onto hardware to make it run properly.

It sounds like chat mix features are a priority for you instead of sound quality, which is what Penrose is marketed for. Thankfully, the gaming headset market is a healthy one and you can easily look for a different headset that suits your specific usage case.

 

[termdisc]

No it cannot be done through Penrose, but you may be able to accomplish something similar by changing the volume of the sources

When connected to my PS5 via dongle and my iPhone via BT, when I lower the phone's volume via BT, the volume of the PS5 audio is also lowered as if the phone controlled the overall volume of the headset. How can I lower the volume on my phone via BT while maintaining the volume of the PS5?

cc @Audeze

 

[CommunistWitchDr]

1. They never said it was impossible, they said they made a design decision not to in order to keep things as simple as possible across all platforms
2. Hate to be that guy, but firmware IS software, specifically firmware is software loaded onto hardware to make it run properly.

It sounds like chat mix features are a priority for you instead of sound quality, which is what Penrose is marketed for. Thankfully, the gaming headset market is a healthy one and you can easily look for a different headset that suits your specific usage case.

1. So their solution to keep things simple across all platforms is, instead of something where they do the work once and it works across every platform from windows/mac/linux/ps/xbox to random OSes only some guy and his brother use without ever needing further user input, to rely on maybe implementing a running-on-the-host-pc software side solution later that will be platform dependent? Yeah, no, that's not simplifying things, that's just lazy.
2. It's disingenuous at best to refer to your firmware as software in the context they were using, if they did in fact mean firmware and not the software on the system. Software gives the implication something running on the client's computer would need to be a part of the equation, which is not the case with decent firmware as proven by competing products. Don't call a square a rectangle when you can call it a square. Especially not when you're calling it a rectangle to get around how much better the more difficult for you solution is for literally everyone but you having to implement it.

My priority is having both, which is what makes it so incredibly annoying that the Penrose has skipped out on the most basic of gaming headset features. It just leaves choices of adequate headset / excellent headphones or excellent headset / adequate headphones when it could easily have been an excellent headset / excellent headphones option by doing some basic market research and making sure to have feature parity with the competition. Now the only way to get both is to have both and fuss with switching between them depending on what I'm doing.

 

[purple52]

No it cannot be done through Penrose, but you may be able to accomplish something similar by changing the volume of the sources

When connecting a phone to the headset via Bluetooth, will the volume of the Bluetooth audio be controllable via the phone volume control? I ask because previous discussion has indicated that the PC master volume currently has no effect.

Not wishing to jump on the negativity bandwagon, but given that these headsets are being sold specifically for gaming, its surprising that providing easy control over mix and mic volumes doesn't appear to be a higher priority.