Need some suggestions for a good headset for gaming

Hello my fellow NBR peeps! Could you take a bit of time out of your busy lives modding your laptops to infinity and/or fragging nubs online to tell me what would be a good headset to use for gaming and the occasional (read: once a month is plenty) music listening to?

I'm mainly on teamspeak or skype, a few youtube vids and plenty anime watching and MUCH gaming. My price limit is about $75 USD, I suppose I could stretch to $80 if need be, but I'd rather keep at around 75. I was looking at the Alienware TactX headset, but an earlier thread made me doubt myself, so now I'm asking here. Relying on my brethren and sistren of NBR. Anybody got any advice on anything I might get instead that's better? Or is that headset good?

I'll be using it with this laptop here, and I plan using it for the mic as well, so if it's like 5.1 or 7.1 and requires 3-4 input jacks, that'd make the mic useless.

So without further ado, suggestions my friends? =D

 

Plantronics Gamecom 377 Not exactly surround sound, but I mean they're headphones I doubt they'd actually give you surround sound. About 40-50 dollars on newegg, and 31 on provantage

 

Well I can't use surround sound and use the mic on the headset, which kind of blows, but I'll look into it =D

 

Hmm, what is your budget?

 

$75 USD, as in the first post. I could probably push to get $80 I suppose, but I'd rather not cross $75.

 

I'll second the GameCom 377. It's one of the best values in the sub-$100 headset market, let alone sub-$50. Sound quality is great, and many people have said it sounds like something much more expensive than it is.

 

Well that's two for the GameCom, any other suggestions? I should send the TactX to the grave before it arrived?

 

I have the turtle beach x11 headset for my Xbox 360, but it is supposed to work for PC gaming too. I really like it alot and its in you price range, I think it is 65 or 70 dollars. I use it to play mostly call of duty games, it has nice lows for the explosions and such and the highs are nice and crisp. I recommend it to anybody looking for an affordable gaming headset.

 

Haha I don't think you interpreted my suggestion xD

The Gamecom 377 only requires a 2 jacks, a headphone and mic jack.

I was explaining how it's sort of physically impossible to achieve surround sound in a headset where the sound is coming from only 2 physical places IMO

 

I've seen headsets with literal multiple sound outputs. Like on the band going over your head there's 5 speakers in different positions with the earmuffs being for the bass. It's freaky stuff mon. Freakay.

But virtual 5.1 surround seems to work for peeps, and I'm leaning toward this Gamecom more and more. I keep getting directed to the GameCom or this "TekNmotion Pulsewave 2".

 

Keep in mind that in a headset with multiple speakers per earcup, there is inevitably going to be a compromise of quality for quantity; you can have one really good quality speaker, or several smaller less powerful ones in the same amount of space.

As for virtual surround, I've always thought it's a gimmick. I've never had any trouble discerning positional audio with my stereo headsets, since the effects are processed by the game itself anyway.

 

Master is my clone baby he says the same stuff I say so I endorse this posting.

 

Well I don't know about virtual sound or anything firsthand, it's a miracle I even have this laptop, everything else I've got is so pathetically cheap hehe.

As for the headset I described with multiple speakers, the speakers weren't only in the earcup, they were overhead too. It was odd, but I'm not really bothering with that one. I was just saying that those 5.1 headsets etc wouldn't be useful for me unless they had USB connectors for that. I always felt virtual surround would be worthless as well, but if in the case of the pulsewave 2 it came as a bonus, I'd not complain =D

As for the Gamecom, I was reading some reviews on newegg where people complained it was heavy and dug into their heads etc, is that true? And I hope I'm not sounding hopeless, I just want as much feedback as I can get before I decide what to order. I won't be able to get anything else again for a good while you see. This includes if it comes and isn't working, I won't be able to return it for a new one either.

 

The GameCom fits firmly on the head, but I wouldn't say it digs in, and I have a pretty large head. It won't fall off on its own, but you can still shake it off with sufficient head motion if you wanted to.

 

Ok, I've been review hunting again =D
I think I'll get the GameCom, the Pulsewave has a high failure rate it seems, though they both work well when they work apparently. Thanks for the advice and if anyone has anything else to add feel free ^^

 

Good choice. I hope you like it.

 

Thanks, I hope I do too. I'll be back here near Christmas to ask the same question but for a gaming mouse. Hell, the mouse I have now probably costs $2 USD. And is 400 dpi.