Max Bellum
New Head-Fier
Looking for approval to post the following:
As many have come to realize; a pair of special cans are needed for gaming especially if you want to take advantage of 3D audio. There are various already discussed in forums as to the reasons so I’m not going to belabor the point. With this in mind, I went out and picked what were considered the leading top three for the PS5; Steelseries ARCTIS 7P vs Audeze Penrose vs Sony Pulse. Let me start with I am neither paid nor given any equipment to test by any vendor – I do this for myself and out of my own pocket with no axe to grind for any vendor. My review is based on 28 hours of game time with each headset having at least 4+ hours of review.
The answer which surprised even me was – Sony. I tried all three playing Call of Duty (COD) Warzone and Borderlands 3. For a deeper read see below.
You’d think by looking at my own choices in cans (below) that Penrose would be the easy winner – sadly no; While Penrose had the best music reproduction of the three, it failed at the quality of the 3d sound effects and bringing the sounds close to you. Penrose replayed my music on Spotify the best, but lacked the emersion that the Sony’s had. I was so hoping the Penrose would win as I really like the technology, but it had two other issues which just put it down for me; The headband on the Penrose was so tight it gave me a headache after an hour of playing – no amount of fiddling would fix this. Second, weight - these things are very heavy and long gaming sessions just make these really uncomfortable. Suggest they look at Steelseries headband idea – this was quite smart.
Sony Pulse 3D wireless – while they trend towards a heavier bass which you cannot control, the airiness of it was very good and it did an exceptional job on the 3d and the general effects of the games. You felt like you were in the middle of things. This represented itself the best in games like COD; In one episode of COD, I was snipping with another player both of us long distance, both on the ground with him on my right and he was shot first and I could hear the bullet hit and his expire right next to my ear – it was both impressive and uncanny. When you’re in buildings and someone is upstairs *only Sony* seems to be able to create the 3d effect of knowing which direction the feet are traveling / what corner of the room upstairs they are in (Nuketown is an exceptional example of this) No headphones I’ve listened to have ever done as good a job as this in bringing the game to you and making you feel part of the experience like the Sony Pulse have. I tried all 3 in almost the exact same situations and Sony easily bested the other 2. I found myself over the course of playing going back to the Sony’s to play in because the quality of the game experience was so much better.
Steelseries ARCTIS 7P sound quality was the least balanced and while bass was high (meh) it had few controls to correct. Worse was the stage was too airy and too far away – so the sound effects didn’t sound like they were near you – more like you were watching them rather than them impacting you. Grenades were especially like this. Sound reproduction was marginal when listening to Spotify – nothing special and was slightly below Sony’s. Honestly these were the least viable option in spite of being hyped as PS5 3d audio. The general build quality of these were pretty poor too – though they were the one of the most comfortable to wear (headband).
So net net – get yourself a set of Sony’s Pulse for PS5 if you’re really there to game. I realize that this may mean buying them on ebay due to the scalping going on but that may be the only choice for a while. (PS - Sony you ARE creating this problem and should have known better than to create this artificial market. Sad state of affairs and I would not blame COVID for this – straight up poor planning by Sony.)
HD800S – Favorite for critical listening
Focal Utopia – Favorite for personal enjoyment
Shure Se946 – Commuters/daily
Sony WH-1000XM3 - Flying
As many have come to realize; a pair of special cans are needed for gaming especially if you want to take advantage of 3D audio. There are various already discussed in forums as to the reasons so I’m not going to belabor the point. With this in mind, I went out and picked what were considered the leading top three for the PS5; Steelseries ARCTIS 7P vs Audeze Penrose vs Sony Pulse. Let me start with I am neither paid nor given any equipment to test by any vendor – I do this for myself and out of my own pocket with no axe to grind for any vendor. My review is based on 28 hours of game time with each headset having at least 4+ hours of review.
The answer which surprised even me was – Sony. I tried all three playing Call of Duty (COD) Warzone and Borderlands 3. For a deeper read see below.
You’d think by looking at my own choices in cans (below) that Penrose would be the easy winner – sadly no; While Penrose had the best music reproduction of the three, it failed at the quality of the 3d sound effects and bringing the sounds close to you. Penrose replayed my music on Spotify the best, but lacked the emersion that the Sony’s had. I was so hoping the Penrose would win as I really like the technology, but it had two other issues which just put it down for me; The headband on the Penrose was so tight it gave me a headache after an hour of playing – no amount of fiddling would fix this. Second, weight - these things are very heavy and long gaming sessions just make these really uncomfortable. Suggest they look at Steelseries headband idea – this was quite smart.
Sony Pulse 3D wireless – while they trend towards a heavier bass which you cannot control, the airiness of it was very good and it did an exceptional job on the 3d and the general effects of the games. You felt like you were in the middle of things. This represented itself the best in games like COD; In one episode of COD, I was snipping with another player both of us long distance, both on the ground with him on my right and he was shot first and I could hear the bullet hit and his expire right next to my ear – it was both impressive and uncanny. When you’re in buildings and someone is upstairs *only Sony* seems to be able to create the 3d effect of knowing which direction the feet are traveling / what corner of the room upstairs they are in (Nuketown is an exceptional example of this) No headphones I’ve listened to have ever done as good a job as this in bringing the game to you and making you feel part of the experience like the Sony Pulse have. I tried all 3 in almost the exact same situations and Sony easily bested the other 2. I found myself over the course of playing going back to the Sony’s to play in because the quality of the game experience was so much better.
Steelseries ARCTIS 7P sound quality was the least balanced and while bass was high (meh) it had few controls to correct. Worse was the stage was too airy and too far away – so the sound effects didn’t sound like they were near you – more like you were watching them rather than them impacting you. Grenades were especially like this. Sound reproduction was marginal when listening to Spotify – nothing special and was slightly below Sony’s. Honestly these were the least viable option in spite of being hyped as PS5 3d audio. The general build quality of these were pretty poor too – though they were the one of the most comfortable to wear (headband).
So net net – get yourself a set of Sony’s Pulse for PS5 if you’re really there to game. I realize that this may mean buying them on ebay due to the scalping going on but that may be the only choice for a while. (PS - Sony you ARE creating this problem and should have known better than to create this artificial market. Sad state of affairs and I would not blame COVID for this – straight up poor planning by Sony.)
HD800S – Favorite for critical listening
Focal Utopia – Favorite for personal enjoyment
Shure Se946 – Commuters/daily
Sony WH-1000XM3 - Flying
