Gaming Headset

Hi guys

I'm looking at maybe getting a gaming headset, not one thats too fancy though as I'll mostly use it when playing at night.

Any recommendations on something under R500?:)

Also, if it supports 5.1 sound (which would be nice), how could I go about setting that up for when I play off my 360? I currently have the 360 outputting to my SyncMaster 2494HS via an HDMI cable, then I connect the Audio output on the screen to my PC so that it plays through those speakers.:p

Note: A mic is not necessary, so should actually be gaming headphones :)

I use the Logitech Clearchat Pro and think it's quite good. Nice clarity of audio. Not sure if price although I think it's in your range. Got mine from Incredible Corruption :p

Roccat Kave has 5.1 and is a really, really nice headset I hear. Sells for about R650 tho

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Originally Posted by Staple2

Roccat Kave has 5.1 and is a really, really nice headset I hear. Sells for about R650 tho

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I been checking them out and they look really great! Might wait awhile and get those.

anyone have any idea how I'd get the 5.1 sound out though?

Rather get a SteelSeries headset. Roccat is befok, but it doesn't work for everyone as it tends to hurt your head ontop over time or is just too heavy.

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Originally Posted by Pr⊕phet

Rather get a SteelSeries headset. Roccat is befok, but it doesn't work for everyone as it tends to hurt your head ontop over time or is just too heavy.

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I 2nd this, I own a SteelSeries and it is nice for gaming!

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Originally Posted by iOverflow

I 2nd this, I own a SteelSeries and it is nice for gaming!

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I have both the Roccat and a SteelSeries, next one I get for myself is definitely a SteelSeries.

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Originally Posted by Pr⊕phet

Rather get a SteelSeries headset. Roccat is befok, but it doesn't work for everyone as it tends to hurt your head ontop over time or is just too heavy.

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Any advice on a specific SteelSeries to get? :)

Is it worth it to go for say 5.1/7.1 as to normal stereo?Seeing as I have only a normal stereo headset?

5.1 headphones....oh gawd. OK crash course (wall of text, but I think worthwhile):

A single human ear can for our current purposes not distinguish direction. The sound localization (two ears now) comes mainly from 2 things:

1. Time differences: The sound reaches both ears but arrives at the one a short while later.
2. Level differences: Sound arrives at the second ear slightly weaker, plus the head reflects some of it too.

The combination of the above can be interpreted by the brain to work out the position (Evolution FTW: Hearing where that tiger's growl comes from is a survival advantage ;)). This work very nicely...but only if you've got one sound source (e.g. speaker) feeding both ears. This is not the case with headphones. The left ear cannot hear what the right headphone speaker is playing. The solution is to simulate the above two effects. You do this by calculating the sound feed for each ear in the games 3D environment, then delaying it slightly + reduce loudness and adding the result to the feed of the opposite ear. i.e. Left ear hears left channel plus a modified version of the right channel. The extent to which you delay & reduce the signal depends on the player's orientation in the 3D world.

All of this is achieved by *drum roll* correct software settings & game code....not special headphones that some sneaky marketing department wants to sell you. The headset does not have access to the info you need to do this (e.g. player orientation). In short you need these two correctly configured:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAL
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DirectSound#DirectSound3D
Plus the game needs to utilize these two interfaces correctly.

Now one thing I omitted above for simplicity: The shape of the ear does affect how sound is perceived. So if you've got a 5.1 sound card and headphones with multiple drivers (speakers) hitting the ear from different angles then the ear can get a small amount of directional info from this. This benefit you have to weigh against a (serious) quality issue: You've got R500 Rand to spend. That cash is spread over either 2 drivers (simple stereo headphones) or 6 drivers (5.1 headphones)....which do you think will buy you better quality drivers?

In conclusion: Sticky to 2 channel stereo headphones unless you're looking in the R1000+ range.