What Sound hardware for best experience with headphones?

[gimpymoo 10]

My current audio setup is a Xonar DX with Logitech Z5500 and a pair of Goldring DR150s.

Previously, I have only gamed on Stereo speakers or using the DR150's, when using the headphones, I have tried downmixing the 7.1 to Stereo and Dolby headphones but never really been impressed with the results.

Not long ago, I setup my rear surround speakers and was blown away by the atmosphere it added when playing Arma 3. It really does add a "warzone" type atmosphere which I never "got" with the headphones before. 5.1 with the Sub and rear speakers, it is a superb gaming experience.

How would one best replicate this experience with a set of cans?

Any devs able to comment on what they use inhouse?

[Tonci87 163]

Lol, Devs are not really known to have top of the line hardware... (maybe the lead Audio guy, but he isn´t on the forums that often)

I use a Roccat Kave 5.1 Headset. Absolutely awesome! (Try JSRS 2.1 for maximum immersion)

[Drakenof 11]

Better having really good stereo headphones than these garbage " gamer " fake 5.1 / 7.1

Sennheiser PC 360 stil the ruler of this kingdom.

[Tonci87 163]

Better having really good stereo headphones than these garbage " gamer " fake 5.1 / 7.1

Sennheiser PC 360 stil the ruler of this kingdom.

Do some research, the Roccat Kave is not a "fake" 5.1 Headset. It has real 5.1 Sounds (three drivers on every side)

[Andy230 10]

As Drakenof said: better use real stereo headset than 7.1 or 5.1. I have Sennheiser PC 360 + Auzentech Forte - great combo. I also have Roccat Kave but it is very unconforttable compare to PC 360. ;-)

[FatFukinLenny 3]

Just stick with what you have tbh, nothing wrong with those DR150's. You only have 2 ears, don't buy into the marketing bollox with 5.1 this and 7.1 that.

I use a Xonar STX and Sennheiser 518's and when using a sound mod you are set..

[xendance 3]

As Drakenof said: better use real stereo headset than 7.1 or 5.1. I have Sennheiser PC 360 + Auzentech Forte - great combo. I also have Roccat Kave but it is very unconforttable compare to PC 360. ;-)

Yes, stereo is better. Your hearing is stereo anyway ;)

I have steelseries siberia v2, it has decent bass and clear sound.

[Xalteva 10]

Nothing comes close to the PC350/360,if you want the best gaming headset nowadays ! you will have to spend those 180 EUR :D

[raven_jj 1]

I have one problem with stereo. It's made for speakers, and when there's a sound directly to the side, its hearable only in one ear.

[Belbo 462]

Yes, stereo is better. Your hearing is stereo anyway ;)

No, it's not. It's simply not. Your hearing is 3 dimensional. Modern surround setups cover at least 2 dimensions (which is one more than stereo). -> Wikipedia: Sound Localization

If you'd try Arma once with a surround setting, you'll never go back to stereo.

It's right though, that a cheap surround setup probably sounds worse than a stereo setup in the same price range. To have a comparable quality, you have to pay. I'd recommend to get a complete 5- or 7.1-Setup (Creative maybe? I personally like the Creative sound systems) instead of buying single speakers.

In regards of surround headphones I'd recommend Logitech G35 (or G930 - wireless). It's got so called "7.1"-Sound, though it's just 6.2-Sound, if you'd like to get picky. (3 loudspeakers on every side adds up to 6 (+2 base speakers, I'm not sure if they're separate though), as the center channel is missing) But, to be honest: The Logitech software is awefull and gets only terrible maintenance.

[gimpymoo 10]

Thank you for the replies.

I have previously discounted "Gaming Surround sound headsets" as marketing jibberish and have firmly been in the camp of "Hi-Fi is best" BUT, do they serve a purpose? I am open either way.

Tonic, I will try the JRS sound mod.

Pooley, you are right, the DR150's are good, it just now having experienced the game on 5.1 Surround sound, it was mind blowing as an experience. Maybe trying to replicate that same experience with cans is difficult and there has to be a compromise.

Personally. I am not a fan of Dolby Headphone (I have read it suits some drivers better than others?), with the DR150's, it just seems to add a very wide sound stage to the point of making an echo.

Would switching to closed back headphones make a difference?

Also, is it best to have the soundcard "downmix" the 7.1 to Stereo or is best just to have the "source" as Stereo?

Many thanks.

[Grumpy Old Man 3545]

I've never liked any of those 5.1/7.1 headsets.

Everytime you move your head to increase the spatial awareness you're moving the sound sources with you, this defeats the purpose of having a set of surround speakers in the first place.

Get a somewhat affordable 5.1 set with a proper amplifier and full sized speakers if you got the money/room for it and you're golden.

If your speakers/headphones are stereo the source should of course be stereo.

[Belbo 462]

Everytime you move your head to increase the spatial awareness you're moving the sound sources with you, this defeats the purpose of having a set of surround speakers in the first place.

I never got the hang of screens. If I turn my head to increase the spatial awareness, I just see the rest of my room and not the things in game.

Sorry dude, but I had to do it. ;)

[Grumpy Old Man 3545]

I take it you don't have TrackIR?

[Belbo 462]

I take it you don't have TrackIR?

Nope. But the screen (as a factual representation of the virtual surroundings) still defines the directions of your virtual ears. Not your actual head position. It's not a problem of headphones or not, it's a limitation in the way TrackIR (or head tracking in general) works.

[Grumpy Old Man 3545]

Moving your head helps to locate a sound source. No matter your head position, real or virtual.

If you've got headphones this no longer works.

[christianmo 10]

A lot of people has a misconception that stereo headphones are not capable of true 3D audio positioning. If you don't believe me put on a pair of decent stereo headphones and watch

.

The way audio is done in games is briefly explained by this article:

3D game audio uses Head Related Transfer Function (HRTF) algorithms to fake the effects of the pinnae, the head and various listening environments, so that injecting the sound straight into the ear canal can produce the impression of real 3D audio sources.

The same process is still necessary when using 5.1/7.1 headphones.

This is all theoretical though. If you have the possibility of borrowing a pair of surround sound headphones you could do a blind test to see which works the best for you.

[Ezcoo 47]

The CMSS-3D binaural simulation that Creative uses in its sound cards is superior compared to Dolby Headphones that Xonar uses, as Dolby is meant to simulate room-like or cinema-like 3D effect, which creates an awful echo effect when you use it with headphones. The CMSS-3D simulates the 3D effect without the horrible "room echo" that Dolby technologies use. Hardware test sites recommend eg. Creative Sound Blaster X series soundcards (that use CMSS-3D) to achieve the best 3D effect with binaural simulation. I have tested both Dolby and CMSS-3D binaural simulation personally too, and I agree with the test sites - while the 3D simulation sounds awful with Dolby, the level of 3D effect with CMSS-3D is impressive.

I'd get personally Creative SBX with high-quality headphones (eg. from AKG, Sennheiser or Superlux) that produce vibrant and nuanced soundscape. Note that the quality of headphones affects the level of binaural simulation effect too, as proper headphones can play the binaural effect more accurately.

Edit: christianmo is right, here's another high-quality vid with only two audio channels, left and right (stereo) but the 3D effect level is still almost creepy:

Note that the recording behind the link contains strong violence, don't listen to it if you're sensitive person.

[Belbo 462]

Moving your head helps to locate a sound source. No matter your head position, real or virtual.

If you've got headphones this no longer works.

But with Arma we have two ways of moving our heads: Moving our own head (which is basically useless, since we don't see the screen anymore if we turn too far.) and moving our virtual head. With TrackIR you move both your own and your virtual head. That way it's even better to have surround headphones instead of surround speakers: The sound sources move with your head movement from one speaker to another - and that's completely dependant on your virtual head movement and not at all on your real head movement.

Let's say, we have a sound source 90° to your left. You turn your real head 90° to your left and you would suspect to here the sound frontal (0°). With surround speakers that works perfectly fine. But don't suspect to see anything 90° to your left, your screen is in front of you.

If you turn your virtual head 90° to your left, the sound will come directly from the front and not from 90° left. With TrackIR you move your real head to the left to turn your virtual head to the left. But your real headmovement has nothing to do with your spatial awareness. It's just a device to control your virtual spatial awareness. Using headphones garantees that you hear exactly what your virtual ears hear. Your spatial awareness stems from the spatial surroundings of your virtual presence. When using surround speakers and TrackIR you turn your head to the sound source at 90° to the left, but as soon as you do that, your virtual ears align and the sound source is suddenly in front of you and not in the direction your real head is facing (in this example you would hear the sounds that you'd suspect to hear from your left to your right).

[Grumpy Old Man 3545]

...

I was just referring to your post of not being able to change your visual surroundings by moving your head, which, in fact, is done by TrackIR.

With TrackIR you don't have to turn your head 90° to turn your in game head by 90° if you didn't know.

[PTV-Jobo 820]

Better having really good stereo headphones than these garbage " gamer " fake 5.1 / 7.1

Sennheiser PC 360 stil the ruler of this kingdom.

I had a friend suggest them to me, spent shit-tons of money on 'em and ended up giving them to my father. The audio was alright, but those things made me feel like my head was put into a psychotic vice after the first minute or two. And before anyone says it--yes, I stretched them over my HAF 932 for about 3 weeks give or take. They didn't come off that case at all until the 3 weeks was up as a test. They loosened up, but ever-so-slightly. That was just the major complaint on the list of complaints.

One could argue about not buying into so-called "gamer garbage", but I would argue also that just because something is expensive, doesn't also mean the best neither. To be honest, I had years ago a cheap $30 no name brand headset that sounded and felt better than those 360's, lol.

[Brisse 78]

My opinion:

5.1 headsets are crap. Buy a good pair of stereo headphones. Do not look at "gaming headsets". They are usually crap. The Senn PC360 is the only one worth even looking at.

Look towards "reference class" or "audiophile" open back over ear headphones. They are usually marketed towards music listening and production but IMO gamers should be looking at that stuff instead of the crappy "gaming headsets".

I'm really happy with my Sennheiser HD650 and Xonar Essence STX. I also have proper 5.1 home cinema at my computer but the headphones are so excellent that I never use the speakers.

[Bee8190 10]

My opinion:

5.1 headsets are crap. Buy a good pair of stereo headphones. Do not look at "gaming headsets". They are usually crap. The Senn PC360 is the only one worth even looking at.

Look towards "reference class" or "audiophile" open back over ear headphones. They are usually marketed towards music listening and production but IMO gamers should be looking at that stuff instead of the crappy "gaming headsets".

I'm really happy with my Sennheiser HD650 and Xonar Essence STX. I also have proper 5.1 home cinema at my computer but the headphones are so excellent that I never use the speakers.

I never bothered with gaming headsets either as some of them coast as much as proper cans dedicated to serious music listening. Unfortunately I have to take a stab at vanilla sounds once again and

say that rather expensive headphones or 5.1 & 2.1 set up's will be simply wasted on arma. Some sounds are high resolution and great but overall not really worth it,

#AKG K550 should be plenty good

[bravo 6 0]

I'm not using any extra sound card. Just a simple stereo headset is enough.

Some headsets can change the sound quality for worse. I tried one from Razer BlackShark and didn't like it for ArmA3. I'm using the Sennheiser PC 350 SE for 2 months and I'm happy.

[PTV-Jobo 820]

Since it appears many here are not buying headsets but high quality headphones, I'd like to know if there are any suggestions in the microphone department to pair with the headphones? I live home with family currently, and they can sometimes be a bit "shouty", lol, so I am curious if there are some 3rd party mic's that aren't blasting background chatter and noise into it when you try using it. I've found myself on the market for new headset since my Plantronics headset decided to break in a new way--hyper sensitive mic that still produced sound even when using the in-line mute on the headset, lol. So I'm thinking of trying to go a different direction that an all-in-one headset, but unsure on the mic part to pair with a headset.