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What gaming headphones to buy?

907K views 11K replies 533 participants last post by  lennyr 
#1 ·
In anticipation of Halo 3 I am looking to get headphones. In my limited research I selected it down to Turtle beach Ear Force X2 and TRITTON AX360, leaning strongly towards the AX360 (the AX360 can take the XBX360's optical output and do a 5.1 surround sound). Any other recommendations? Thanks
 
#9,113 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by bbexperience /forum/post/18899141


PJ's talking about an amp/device that takes a 2 channel stereo signal and uses Dolby Headphone processing it to create a 5.1 surround effect. Probably the best choices to do that are the Astro Mixamp or the Tritton Ax720. Once you hear Dolby Headphone in action it almost becomes a necessity.



Edit: I should mention that you can use any amp you want with either of the devices above. So you can still get a clean, amplified signal and have Dolby processing.

So how would i hook a mixamp to the creek amp?


I have an Optical cable and rca cables


One thing though, Isn't double amping generally be considered a bad thing?
 
#9,114 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by TheNewb /forum/post/18899350


So how would i hook a mixamp to the creek amp?


I have an Optical cable and rca cables


One thing though, Isn't double amping generally be considered a bad thing?

1st, I reread what I wrote...and it was wrong.
The Mixamp or Ax720 takes a dolby digital signal and uses Dolby Headphone processing to position those sounds correctly within a 2 channel headphone. It basically makes the headphone sound like it has a 5.1 soundfield, using only the stereo speakers. Clear now?


That being said, you'd take the optical from the Xbox and connect it to the Dolby Headphone processor, and then take a '3.5mm to L/R RCA' cable ( like this one ) and use that to connect the headphone 'out' connection on the DH processor to the RCA 'in' connection on the Creek amp.


I can't really answer about double amping in general, but I can tell you that I do it with a Little Dot 1+ and the Tritton Ax720 and it works great. Many other people use various amps along with the Astro Mixamp. So it's a very popular solution among gamers.
 
#9,115 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by bbexperience /forum/post/18899141


PJ's talking about an amp/device that takes a 2 channel stereo signal and uses Dolby Headphone processing it to create a 5.1 surround effect. Probably the best choices to do that are the Astro Mixamp or the Tritton Ax720. Once you hear Dolby Headphone in action it almost becomes a necessity.



Edit: I should mention that you can use any amp you want with either of the devices above. So you can still get a clean, amplified signal and have Dolby processing.


well technically, and why it works so well, it's taking a 5.1 digital source signal, and converting it to a virtualized 2 channel signal, if you feed it a 2 channel signal, it can virtualize it, but nowhere near as well.... the reason DH works so well is because all 5 channels are present in the 2ch stream you're hearing.
 
#9,116 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by formulanerd /forum/post/18899904


well technically, and why it works so well, it's taking a 5.1 digital source signal, and converting it to a virtualized 2 channel signal, if you feed it a 2 channel signal, it can virtualize it, but nowhere near as well.... the reason DH works so well is because all 5 channels are present in the 2ch stream you're hearing.

Yeah, I corrected myself later when I realized I had that wrong.
 
#9,117 ·
Yeah, as has been said, it takes the digital 5.1 signal from the optical out and outputs a 2 channel signal for headphones that is virtualized surround sound created from the 5.1 signal. You could hook up an external amp as bb has said, although there may or may not even be a need for one (when gaming), depending on which headphones you buy and how hard they are to drive.


"Double amping" isn't ideal from a pure sound quality/signal stand point, but it works fine to get more volume in cases where a line out isn't available, such as with the mixamp and AX720. A lot of us are amping the headphone output since there isn't a line out available, and it works fine. Probably sacrifices a little sound quality, but in these cases you really wouldn't notice because it's not like the SQ is top notch to begin with, if that makes sense.


A regular amp like the creek (I'm not familiar with this particular amp) is great for music, especially when fed by a nice DAC, and would work for 2 channel with gaming as well, but the thing that all of us here in the gaming headphone thread find to be a necessity when gaming is actually the dolby headphone decoding as we talked about before, using either the astro mixamp or AX720 system (which is not quite as good, but is a complete system including headphones). Dolby headphone offers a more immersive and realistic sound stage for gaming in comparison to standard 2 channel as you are/were intending to hook it up. This is because most games offer true 5.1 sound, and the dolby headphone processing use all 5 channels to virtualize surround sound specifically for use with headphones. For me, and pretty much anyone who has tried it, it's a "must" for gaming with headphones.


Of course you can definitely hook up your amp to the regular 2 channel analog output of your gaming systems as well, like you were intending, and it will work and sound fine, you just won't have the more immersive 5.1 virtualized surround sound from the dolby headphone. And if you've never heard dolby headphone, you wouldn't know what you're missing anyway
 
#9,118 ·
Dolby headphone is tasty!
 
#9,119 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by SID3W8Z /forum/post/18900557


Dolby headphone is tasty!

Yes, it tastes like bacon!
 
#9,120 ·
Anyone have a suggestion for attaching a mic to headphones for gaming? I would like the mic to be removable if at all possible so I can just listen to music sometimes without the mic attached.
 
#9,121 ·
depends on the headphone, i did a small curved piece of wood that matched the cup, and velcro... pictures on page 68.
 
#9,122 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by biglen /forum/post/18902853


Anyone have a suggestion for attaching a mic to headphones for gaming? I would like the mic to be removable if at all possible so I can just listen to music sometimes without the mic attached.

It all depends on the headphone, and how much convenience and how good you want it to look. Anything can be done with zip ties and velcro.
 
#9,123 ·
Sideways I think you mean hot glue and duct tape??


But seriously though, the AD700 a lot of people either glue or velcro a mic to the side, and our very own sideways makes a "gaming cable" for the AKG headphones with (stock) detachable cable, which offers a mic port for a detachable mic. Those two headphones are probably the most popular to be modded for gaming around here. The rest of the ones people use, they either use a throat mic / similar, or no mic. But really, most headphones with detachable cable, sideways (or someone else) could probably come up with a reasonable (professional) solution, like the one for the K702, otherwise, you could velcro the mic to the headphones. A final option which may be more pricey and not always an option on all headphone designs, is to have someone like sideways (or do it yourself) open the headphone up, and install a 3.5mm female jack to insert a removable mic into. He's done this on some headphones in the past, and they came out good, but I'm not sure what the pricing would be since it's pretty labor intensive and there's some risk in breaking something as well. You'd have to talk to him about that, to see if it's worth it.
 
#9,124 ·
In other news, I was listening to some music last night off the buffalo dac with the balanced hd600s / OCC cable, and man, it sounds so damn good. Incredibly transparent, I feel like my ears are the microphone, if that makes sense. 96/24 materials sounds awesome, but I want to find some even higher quality stuff to experience too. The buffalo will do something crazy like 352.8khz/32 bit, but my sound card will only do 192/24, so I'd like to at least hear that. I was meaning to get on and play some MW2 last night, but I just couldn't take the headphones off lol, I kept wanting to hear "just one more song."


I really want to try gaming with the buffalo, which I want to try this weekend. It will only be two channel, but I'm still curious to hear it.
 
#9,125 ·
Adios HPX's and happy trails.


Yes, they're officially gone, having been replaced with the K702's.
Ah, HPX's, we hardly knew ye.
 
#9,126 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by bbexperience /forum/post/18904115


Adios HPX's and happy trails.


Yes, they're officially gone, having been replaced with the K702's.
Ah, HPX's, we hardly knew ye.

Haha, PJ messed me up too.... lol.
 
#9,127 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by SID3W8Z /forum/post/18904527


Haha, PJ messed me up too.... lol.

*slowly tapping finger tips together* Muahahahahahahaha! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
 
#9,128 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by nosaj03 /forum/post/18899100


How are you connecting the mixamp and the e7 between the consoles?

Console ---> toslink cable ---> Mixamp ---> 3.5mm ---> E7---> Headphones


I maxed the Mixamp volume, and had the E7 at whatever volume was comfy for me.
 
#9,130 ·
I've always wanted the try the RX700. Very beloved for the price. I hear they make exceptional gaming cans for such a low price.
 
#9,131 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Shin CZ /forum/post/18904893


I've always wanted the try the RX700. Very beloved for the price. I hear they make exceptional gaming cans for such a low price.

Best $30 I have spent. Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure the more expensive cans are much better, but for what I do with them, they are awesome.
 
#9,132 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by biglen /forum/post/18904884


Here are the headphones I'm trying to attach a boom mic to:


Seeing as those have a large, flat surface it seems like it would be easy to get some velcro tape to rig up a detachable mic.
 
#9,133 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by bbexperience /forum/post/18904926


Seeing as those have a large, flat surface it seems like it would be easy to get some velcro tape to rig up a detachable mic.

Not sure how I could Velcro this to the side of the headphones:

 
#9,135 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by GardenVariety /forum/post/18905126


For the ultimate in gaming I would suggest Electrostatic Headphones with Amp and Smyth Realiser. Combined with tactile transducers it actually equals or bests 99% of home theater setups.

Hmmm. Let me root around in my swimming pool full of money and pull out about $4K. Ahh, there it is! Guess I can go shopping now!
 
#9,136 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by biglen /forum/post/18904966


Not sure how I could Velcro this to the side of the headphones:


No, you'd need to do something like what's in this thread to do the velcro job. To use a mic like that one you'd either have to mod the headphone itself or rig up some concoction with a custom cable.
 
#9,137 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by bbexperience /forum/post/18905191


Hmmm. Let me root around in my swimming pool full of money and pull out about $4K. Ahh, there it is! Guess I can go shopping now!

I hope that someday you'll invite me over for a swim!
 
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