What's your headset of choice?

Just before joining here, I bought some Turtle Beach PX11s (they were cheap and I had a gift card) to keep from disturbing the rest of the household when I played late at night. Being able to tell which direction gunshots and footsteps are coming from makes a huge difference!!!!

Obviously, the TB headsets aren't very sturdy, and the sound quality on the lower end models isn't great. What else is everyone using? I see a lot of Tritton and Astro on the pros. Is it worthwhile to step up to Dolby?

I'm a bit of a headset geek.  I run a few setups and keep going back to a pair of TB DX11s with the DSS1 (not 2... the DSS2 sucks balls).  When i dont need to chat i run my Sennheiser's through my DSS1 and it's really astonishing.
 
 
 
Get yourself a dolby converter and you'll be amazed at what it can do to a good set of cans.

I've had my Astro A40s for a couple years and I love them!

gun fer hire wrote:

I'm a bit of a headset geek.

No Gun your just a geek      

I`m using TB PX3`s as they work with xbox and ps3.

I run turtle beach px5's but wish I would have gotten Astros because of the mixamp feature. It would have been helpful to have that feature for recording game audio and gamechat from the team. Instead I have to run an external mixer, etc. which is annoying and I havent quite got the levels right and don't end up recording live gameplay because of it.

Started out the the Turtle Besch X12's, not bad for the price.

but now run TB XP400's, love the sound and having no wires.

I went from Tritton AX720 Pros to my Astro A50's. I wouldn't replace my astro's for anything in this world.

I would say TB x12's, but they heard me say that and now they no longer work. Either that, or one of my kids messed with the knobs and blew out one of the speakers. So now I play farcry instead of what I actually want to play, and my only headset is anger.

When I don't need to talk, I run my Bose noise cancelling and they work fantastic.

Trittons

tritons or the sony ps3 one's both are good !

I've owned a wide variety of headsets over the years. I started with Turtle Beach X3's, then X4's, Tritton AX Pro's and Logitech F540's. A couple years ago I bought Astro A40's, which I absolutely love. Last summer I bought the Tritton Warheads. Although I liked them quite a bit, they were very poorly made and I had to put in tickets for a replacement battery and a replacement base unit within the first month. Then the headset itself finally gave out as well only 4 months later. Although they were still under warranty, I was fed up with them and went back to my Astros. Lesson learned to stick with what works. I've owned all the major brands and Astro is hands down the best, in my opinion.

I use my PS3 headsets. They are ok.

Well , I'll be oddball then. How bout Afterglow wireless? Am I the weakest link.

giotek wired

gun fer hire wrote:

I'm a bit of a headset geek.  I run a few setups and keep going back to a pair of TB DX11s with the DSS1 (not 2... the DSS2 sucks balls).  When i dont need to chat i run my Sennheiser's through my DSS1 and it's really astonishing.
 
 
 
Get yourself a dolby converter and you'll be amazed at what it can do to a good set of cans.

will those work with the X12's

I bought the Skullcandy SLYR headset yesterday and tried it out las night. They connect to the RCA jacks (red / white) on any console and to the controller for chat. They also need a free USB port for power. They are WIRED but the cable is about 15 feet long. I found them to be very comfortable even after a few hours of use. The mixer allows you to control the game / chat mix as well as overall volume and they do have a mute feature (when you need to tell the wife that you'll be "finished in five minutes" heh heh).
One nice feature is that the cables plug into the headset (vs being hard-wired to the headset) and they come with a cable that will allow you to connect it to any music player's standard 3.5mm connector. The mic swivels up and hides inside the left headset so you don't look like an idiot if you use them for music.

Cons:
They are NOT full surround sound.
They let in a little outside noise (this may not be a con since the material also lets your ears "breathe" and therefore not sweat) but that also means you have no excuse not to answer the aforementioned wife.
It takes a little time to get used to the single switch volume controller which you also press for mute.

Price: $64.99 on sale at Best Buy.

I feel that they were a good choice (and they generally get good reviews) in the sub-$100 category for gaming headsets.

I had a set of TB X4's since CoD4 and just bought TB XP5's, They both have been great headests and i will continue to buy TB's they make a great product, imo.

UseeME2 wrote:

gun fer hire wrote:

I'm a bit of a headset geek.  I run a few setups and keep going back to a pair of TB DX11s with the DSS1 (not 2... the DSS2 sucks balls).  When i dont need to chat i run my Sennheiser's through my DSS1 and it's really astonishing.
 
 
 
Get yourself a dolby converter and you'll be amazed at what it can do to a good set of cans.

will those work with the X12's

Sure will! A Dolby Digital converter will work with any headset and give it the capability. The DSS will allow it to operate just as it does now but with Dolby.

I bought the TB X41's when they were relatively new to market. They're comfortable and they sound great (chat and game). The sourround sound capability was mind blowing the first time I put them on. I never thought it was possible to get good quality surround sound out of a headset but these do a superb job. They're discontinued now replaced by the x42's I'd classify them as a great mid range headset. The only CONs would be battery life - they use two AAA batteries to keep the weight down. If you purchase a high quality set of rechargables you can get 10 to 14hrs of use out of them. Using alkaline batteries you'd be lucky to get 6 to 8hrs out of them.

Since I do a lot of recording I was going to make my next set of Astro's primarily for the mix amp's abilities to manually adjust game and chat independently...not that the TB's don't do this adequately / automatically by themselves but being able to adjust that yourself helps recordings if you have someone in game / party that is particularly quiet.

As Slam said he has A40s and loves them..I suggested them to a friend of mine who is a snobby audiophile and I thought he'd nitpick them but he was blown away with the sound quality and surround sound capabilities.

I'd put most TB in the mid range quality / value and Astro's in the high end.

Astro's aren't that great. They have a relatively shallow soundstage and are WAYYYYY overpriced! A decent pair of cans and a dolby digital converter with a mod mic and youll spend 100 less and have MUCH better sound quality... and cans you can use as non mic headphones whenever you want.

Head over to Head-Fi if you want the skinny on all things headphones.

This is the definitive gaming can thread with some awesome info.

http://www.head-fi.org/t/534479/mad-lust-envys-headphone-gaming-guide-updated-5-23-2013-mrspeakers-mad-dog-v-3-2-reviewed

I love my TB's...on my second pair as an upgrade. I've heard Astros are a bit fragile as well. Just because they are main stream doesn't mean they are the best. I'm waiting for Bose to make a pair to knock Astro off their perch.

Unfortunately Bose isn't much better... well better than Astros, of course... but they use great technology with sometimes mediocre quality innards and parts.

If you want audiophile cans that will make Bose ones sound like a cheap set of Koss... a pair of equally priced Sennheiser, Beyerdynamics, Denons or Ultrasones.

But it really all comes down to what an individual is looking for. For those who aren't an audiophile or can't tell a warm set of cans from a cold set... money is better spent on a decent sub $150 pair and adding a MixAmp or DSS. You can take a $60 set of turtle beaches or Trittons and adding the converter... you wont believe the difference.

All of you who don't have a dolby set... i recommend just buying a converter for what you have now. You'll get much more bang for your buck and youll have the converter for any and all future pairs. And use them for movies too... crank the volume and youll be sitting in a THX imax theatre.

Nice

YellowGeeHawd wrote:

I went from Tritton AX720 Pros to my Astro A50's.  I wouldn't replace my astro's for anything in this world.

The same here. I can not STAND TB's as far as I am concerned they are the biggest pieces of crap in the world. I have seen SOOOO many break when even when they are taken care of and still no dice. I loved my AX Pro's but I really love the Astro A50's once I did the firmware update.