A couple of months ago one of our readers emailed me and asked about high end gaming audio headsets. He mentioned that a most gamers don’t have the opportunity to try most of the products used on the Pro Gaming tours, and that many don’t even have a presence in the mainstream retail. He asked about a specific product, the
Tritton AX Pro, and if I could perhaps do a head to head review comparing it to the
Astro A40. Well, here at GN, we aim to please.
Between wedding planning and now preparing for a mid-summer move to the east coast, I’ve been a little behind, but aside from my BlackBerry, AX Pro is probably the thing I’ve used the most the past This is just my first impressions, and I’m saving most of my head to head comparisons to the other headsets I’ve reviewed for the final review, but I do some high and low points I want to cover in basic.
First, the construction and form factor. The
AX Pro is really light, but at the same time is built solidly. In fact, of the high end headsets I’ve reviewed (and I think I’ve covered them all now), this one is easily the sturdiest. It even looks more rugged than the others.
The cords are thick but not obnoxiously so, and even with a lot of options (which I’ll leave the details of to the review), the headset and decoder are easy to assemble, configure and attach to PC, 360, and even my iPod (for grins).
One of the cool features I like that the integrated volume control on the headphone cord uses color LED backlighting to display the relative volume level of each pair of drivers. This is particularly awesome in the dark and matches nicely with my
Saitek Cyborg keyboard.
And those drivers…. The sound from this thing is
REALLY FREAKING GOOD. It’s sometimes difficult when you’re playing a game, or listening to music to really tell the difference between one headset and the next. But for units like the
A40 or the
AX Pro, it’s obvious they are heads and shoulders above most headsets in the marketplace.
Left 4 Dead in particular took advantage of the surround sound.
The two negatives I have so far are in regards to configuration. The first is that the unit requires 2 power adapters to use the headset and the decoder box. In the age of green technologies and high energy costs, this is not something I would have expected. Second, it doesn’t have a battery option for the decoder. Other units may eat the batteries for breakfast, but I’ve found this feature to be very useful, as you can just unplug without untangling from the headset.
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