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5.1 Surround Sound headphones any good?
Cobell
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I was just wondering if anyone has had any experience with the 5.1 surround sound headphones that are floating around these days. Here is an example,
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826235005
Does anyone out there have a set of these or something similar? I am interested in picking up a pair (not necessarily the one linked above). Any personal experiences people have had with 5.1 headphones would be appreciated.
Main things I'm looking for in
1) Are they a true 5.1 experience?
2) Comfort?
3) Relative purchase worth?
4) Sturdy construction?
5) Anything to watch out for when researching what brand/model to buy?
Generally, the public opinion leans towards positive, but I'd like a PA opinion if possible.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826235005
Does anyone out there have a set of these or something similar? I am interested in picking up a pair (not necessarily the one linked above). Any personal experiences people have had with 5.1 headphones would be appreciated.
Main things I'm looking for in
1) Are they a true 5.1 experience?
2) Comfort?
3) Relative purchase worth?
4) Sturdy construction?
5) Anything to watch out for when researching what brand/model to buy?
Generally, the public opinion leans towards positive, but I'd like a PA opinion if possible.
Cobell on
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I have a pair of Bose QC2s and they have some nice simulated surround but 5.1 it is not.
Granted I haven't tried 5.1 headphones but it seems like marketing to me. You are missing 4 of the 6 required channels for 5.1
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Anyway: this place is probably a better place to ask
http://www.biline.ca/headphones.htm
I think they're great. They have very good sound and the surround is precise. They provide me with the surround sound experience without needing the proper space to setup the sattelite speakers. With how my basement is setup, I prefer these to speaker based surround.
If I had the money and a room with acceptable acoustics, I would rather have speakers. That said, these are the best alternative. These are easily the best set of headphones I've used for my computer.
EDIT:
I neglected some of the main things you're looking for. As far as comfort is concerned, I wear thick plastic frame glasses. They headphones press against them and after 2-3 hours it starts to hurt a bit. With thin wire frames, or no glasses, they're comfortable for much longer than that.
I switched to a decent pair of stereo headphones (audiotechnica ath-a700), which sound much better for gaming,music and movies.
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My set, which are over-the-ear cup types, have 3 separate speakers in each ear, and the three standard analog 5.1 stereo plugs or a proprietary plug to connect to an included digital receiver for digital 5.1 sources.
They work pretty darn good, except for a dodgy right front channel which doesn't output the same level of volume/bass as the rest of the channels.
EDIT: Looking at the link in the OP, they appear to be a newer version of the ones I have.
From what I understand there are two classes of headsets. Ones that depend on a chip or soundcard to provide emulated 5.1. These are ones you plug into a standard stereo headphone jack. There are also new headphones that advertise being true 5.1 surround sound. They require alot more cables and have several speakers in each head piece.
In theory, I'd think it would work fine. At the end of the day, all that sound is going through your ears. If you can emulate what the sound field looks like a few millimeters from your ear and generate it from that point, it would be indistinguishable from the real thing.
How successful these guys are I couldn't say, and I would wager that the nuances of an authentic, high-end 5.1 experience would be extremely difficult to reproduce on that kind of tiny scale, but it doesn't strike me as junk science.
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Again, from what I understand, the real 5.1 surround setup do have optical inputs. I'm not sure how it handles channels. Some of the stuff I hope get answered.
A good example of the implementation is the Astro Mixamp.
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Done by using "wave field synthesis". Wikipedia
http://www.psykoaudio.com/
They aren't really available yet though, the guys producing them are local (Calgary) so I'm pimping them out when I can. I've met the people first hand and we've been to a few networking events, really cool guys.
The way they produce the 5.1 sound is supposedly different because of the actual physical characteristics of the headphones. As I said I haven't had a chance to try them since they only have a few real ones made, but I think big production is starting within the next few weeks.
Seriously, though, those look pretty neat.
Be sure you have the appropriate sound card before ordering one, of course, or you could have some great headphones with just stereo sound.
They are good, But strangely, sometimes I'm not sure if I'm actually getting 5.1. There is no single volume control, and the wire tends to get in my way. If I want to use it with the mic on my ps3 it requires another wire and an adapter. The XBox 360 on the other hand works quite well with it. I also hook up my surround sound speakers to the dolby decoder box it comes with and that does provide true surround, all the time.
Regardless, sound quality is great, the attached microphone is really good quality, and can be detached if you don't want it, they're comfy as all get-out, and they work well enough that I can tell where people are firing from in TF2 and CS:S.
Oh also, playing L4D with them makes you shit yourself when you hear a tank barrelling up behind you.
Or to be more technical, the HRTF (Head related transfer function), that is to say, the acoustical effect of your noggin which is how the human brain recognizes positioning, is applied through A. math or B. multi-drivers, instead of by your head actually diffracting the sound waves. If the math isn't done to enough precision or whatever, then it absolutely does sound a little fake in comparison, and using multi-drivers only isn't even close to imitating the proper acoustics, but it's a simple fact of human physiology that any sound whatsoever, with any spatial information whatsoever, can be represented with two channels.
The lights on the decoder (if you're using digital input) tell you if you're getting 5.1. If you're using the 3 channel surround cables then it's up to whatever you have it hooked up to if you're getting "true" 5.1. You need to check your sound card info for that.
I have the AX360's too and my only major complaint is the weight of the headphones. After a lengthy movie or gaming session (I use them primarily for my 360) the weight can give you a headache or at least make your ears ache. That's not to say they're not comfortable, but put anything on your head that long and it's bound to effect you. I'm very headache prone though, so it might not bother others as it does me.
They do an amazing job of giving you 5.1 without having speakers set up in a room for movies and games; they have individual channel volume control and there is a single volume control on the decoder box, assuming you're using that. And if you're not you should probably get a different set of 5.1's because that's the main draw for the Tritton ones.
I can't vouch for other 5.1s but I hear the razor barricudas are really good, particularly if you have the razor sound card; but I wouldn't hesitate to recommend 5.1 headphones to anyone interested. If you want excellent surround sound and want to blare it as loud as you want without bothering others, you can't beat it. Just do your research on the particular one you want before you buy; and make sure where ever you buy has a good return policy just in case they don't suit you. I'm really picky about my headphones, 5.1 or not, so this is important to me.
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And I should say that I do think the headphones are providing 5.1, I'm just sometimes not convinced of it. It's a weird tactile thing. This is during gameplay on my consoles, I don't have surround sound on my PC (and thus don't expect surround on my PC) Either that or I'm deaf and don't know it.
I too am headache prone, but i don't get any from wearing these. In fact I find them to be a bit too loose.
Well, I also tend to have a huge noggin.
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(I have a 5.1 spearkers setup in my living room, but usually play late at night so I don't really get to use it much for games.)
Let me tell you about Demon's Souls....
They're pretty good, largely I think because they offer "optimal" speaker placement. My gaming den doesn't let me put normal speakers where they'd be most effective, so I lose on some of the directional separation that is available. With that in mind, the headphones give incredible spatial awareness. I can pinpoint where a warthog is in Halo 3 from across the map. Audio quality isn't audiophile levels, but you get used to it.
I use the same headphones to play TF2 on the PC and they work just as well. Source engine games don't have as good a sound engine as Halo's, but you can still tell where stuff is coming from without seeing it.
The only serious problem I've had with these headphones (and this will effect any set of headphones I imagine) is games that use the center channel for game audio.. this is the same channel that voice chat comes over, and if you got a machine gun making a racket, there ain't no way in hell you gonna hear your teammates tell you stuff. This might be "realistic" but it's also fucking annoying.
Worst offenders I can name off the top of my head is Left 4 Dead (xbox) and Forza 2.
Other than that though, I use them daily and am genuinely happy with them. Triton's build quality is "sufficient", I know friends who have had various pieces break and my microphone doesn't hold position like it used to. So if you need something durable you might want to shy away from Triton.
http://www.cybersnipa.com/us/products/sonar-5.1-gaming-headset.php
It seems it got mixed reviews, but I heard it gave the best bang for your buck.
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There is evidence to suggest that the shape of your ears also affects how you perceive sound, so headphones will still never produce as directional of a sound as external speakers.
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I highly recommend them.
http://www.zalman.co.kr/ENG/product/Product_Read.asp?idx=213
You do get surround sound. Each headphone has three speakers horizontal to the ear. It works really well, best example I can give is to play L4D with me in the lead. I can pinpoint the tank way before anyone else, and exactly where the threats are coming from.
The only thing I don't like about them is they are a bit heavy on the ears and prone to get loose after a lot of use. ( I mean a LOT of use.)
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+1, those are what I use and they're quite nice.
A possible way to get past is if you have a pro audio sound card with enough inputs, you could also (hypothetically) loopback your gaming card's outputs to your pro audio card's inputs, run them through whatever HRTF VST worked best for your specific ears, then route it to a pair of headphones. But it's a lot of trouble and I'm guessing no one else here has that option anyways.
So when all is said and done 5.1 external speakers is still the best and I'm just talking about this because it's interesting.
http://www.mightyfreestuff.com/audioillusions/virtualhaircut.mp3
Works best with a normal set of stereo headphones, and the effect is uncanny. Basically they get a rubber human head with accurate sculptures of the human ear, put microphones in those ears, and record stuff.
This sounds like a lot of work.
But since I have two pairs of ear-buds, regular headphones and a port for each channel I am totally going to try this.
Most of the so call 5.1 headphone are very poorly made, they sacraficed sound quality for a cheap alternative on providing surround sounds.
Games sound are already recorded with headphone in mind(providing 3d sounds on 2 speaker), so don't worry about if a headhpone is 5.1 or not, its just crappy adversiting. Instead, what you really need is a DTS or DT decoder + good brand name headphone.
Go do some research at head-fi.org and google search "neogaf 5.1 headphone", there's a really huge thread there plus recommandation for true high quality 5.1 sound on your headphone under $200.
I personally used Audio Tech ATH-700 as my gaming headphone + an 5.1 decoder, I forgot the name, but if you want DTS sound on PS3 or Xbox you will need the decoder, if not then you will just need a good sound card to plug the head phone in.
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true 5.1 surround sound speakers will always work better because when sending out sound to a each of the channel it never has to worry about the size of your head.
you'll find great headphones that comes close as long as you're not crazy picky like some of those audiophiles.
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They pretty much say you get some decent 5.1, but it won't compare at all to a real set of speakers, and you're better off buying some really nice stereo headphones for the same price.
I'm wearing a pair of $20 Sennheiser HD201's and this clip sounds amazing.