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Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 1:00 am**

My old headset broke. Had a REALLY thin wire going up to the head phones and it started shorting and became unusable. So, I bought a new set.

Logitech G35

7.1 surround sound with buttons and volume control on the left ear. Played Half Life 2:EP2 cause you could set it to 7.1 mode. Playing the game, I didn't feel as immersed as I thought I would. It sounded ok, but I didn't get the spacial awareness thing I was expecting/hoping for. Turns out, it's only got one speaker in each ear. So, how can it do true surround? I dunno. Didn't seem like it was to me. If I got too far away from the girl, I couldn't really hear what she was saying. And by too far, I'd say 5-10 feet (or what looks like it in game). When getting shot, I still needed to use the red damage indicator to know where things were. I could NOT do it by sound. So, although they sounded good and clear, it wasn't surroundy.

They are HEAVY too. Top of my head hurts from them resting there. I actually played HL2:E2 all the way through in one sitting. I started it a while back, so I was able to get through some of the 'puzzles' quicker. It was surprisingly short. At any rate, I was ready to take them off by the time I was done playing (4-5 hours or so). They are also tight on my head. Squeezing around my ears and stuff. So, over all, not real comfortable for long game sessions. But then, I felt the same about my old set too. So, not sure if there is a set that can be worn for 4+ hours at a time and not get uncomfortable. If there is, I haven't had them yet.

Doing a mic test (echoing back to myself), the mic was really clear. It did pick up a lot of back ground noise though. Other reviews say it's really good at blocking it. So, perhaps there's some settings I need to play with, or it just doesn't do a good job during echo tests.

So, in conclusion, I'm underwhelmed based on the $130 I paid for them. Not sure what I'd have to pay to get true (multi speaker) surround in my headphones. But, I may look into it. Will play with them a bit more before making my final decision.

Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 8:35 am**

With an actual 5.1 speaker setup, I can hear spies sneaking up behind me in TF2, and turn and shoot them quick. I often wonder how often they think I am cheating when I do that.

In summary, fuck those single speaker surround gimmicks. Aint nothing like the real thing baby.

Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 3:33 pm**

Shit. Why didn't you get them a few weeks ago? I just ordered two sets of these Thursday based on good customer reviews at Dell.com.

Maybe I'll send them back and get the Razor Megalodon.

Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 5:36 pm**

I actually bought a logitech headset about a year ago because I needed a new micrphone. I don't know the model.

The head piece itself is not adjustable, and it fits tight as hell on my melon. I wear it around my neck and just put the mic to my lips and use the regular speakers.

Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 6:17 pm**

That's exactly what I'm going to do, Leisher. Had done more research last night and came up with the Magalodon as the next choice. I'm waiting for a few Best Buy reward coupons to show up, then I'm returning the G35 and ordering the Magalodon. It gets good reviews for suround sound as well as comfort. It had issues with 64 bit OSs, but they released a patch last month that fixes the issues supposedly. Also read buying a good USB expansion card (not using the integrated ports) solves the problem. I'm counting on Razor fixing the 64bit issue though instead of buying more ports.

I WILL miss the chipmunk voice mod though. It's funny as hell.

Posted: **Sat Mar 06, 2010 7:55 pm**

I just emailed my Dell rep to change that part of the order. Worst case scenario is that I have to ship the G35s back.

Posted: **Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:26 pm**

Worse than I thought. . . Turns out, when HL2 was in 7.1 mode, I was missing a lot of the audio. I noticed this in one scene were two people were having a conversation with me, and off in the distance, there were vehicles and helicopters milling about. Depending on which direction I was facing, I would hear various parts of that scene. When I put the game into "headphones" mode, I got good stereo sound. Had MUCH better spacial awarness and could hear all the noise going on. However, there were times where the audio would sound echo'y, like I was in a cave. So, even in headphone mode, these headphones didn't work very well.

Looking forward to trying the Megalodon.

Posted: **Wed Mar 10, 2010 4:41 pm**

Megalodons have arrived.

I'm thinking Left4Dead2 will be a good test for the surround sound.

Posted: **Mon Mar 22, 2010 12:31 am**

So, how are they? In more reviews, I'm finding both headsets recommended and game compatability issues with both of them. It seems Vista and 7 make things work better too (I'm still on XP). But over all, MANY games simply don't support surround sound very well. Especially older titles (HL2 included). Both companies seem to be working on fixes. But it appears that surround sound headphones are still too new to be perfect.

But, I'm curious about what you are finding.

Posted: **Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:07 am**

Did more testing. Downloaded the THX Jungle Sounds demo and was underwhelmed. I did have solid stereo affects. I could not determine front to back sounds. Started a DVD up and there was a significant sound quality difference between stereo and surround, I still didn't get a full surround feel. I could tell a big difference between the guy on the left of the screen talking and the guy on the right (spacial awarness thing), but, I still didn't get a front to back feel (other street noises, helecopter in the distance, etc). Sounded MUCH better in the surround mode, but, not true surround. I'm going to mess with it more with the laptop and Vista though. My son runs Win7, and will play with that some too. People report being able to tell where gun fire is coming from in newer games (fallout 3, Left for Dead 2, etc), but not really well in older (CS:Source, TF2, etc). Seems the valve engine doesn't work well.

Also, as far as comfort, I physically modified my set (bent the metal on both sides) so it doesn't squeeze the shit out of my head. WAY better now. I can, and have, worn them for hours with no real discomfort. After 4 plus hours, it's nice to let my head/ears breath a bit. But, no headache or other painful stuff going on. This lets a bit more outside noise into the headset because the seal around the ears isn't as tight, but not too much.

So, I'm not 100% that I want to write off the set. Given that both the G35 and the Megalodon are really limited to actual games supporting surround sound instead of the headphones. Some people believe that with software updates, both will get better over time. Unless they come out with a G35x or Megalodon 2, which ends support for the older sets. . . .

Grundy, other than the Space Squirrel voice, how did they sound? On par with other headsets?

Get a review of the Mega's up here!!

Posted: **Mon Mar 22, 2010 11:24 pm**

To be honest, I haven't tried them yet. My help desk guy has and likes them.

I'll probably give them a go this weekend.

Posted: **Tue Mar 23, 2010 12:05 pm**

Please do. They are on sale again, and I need to know if I need to jump on them. Does your tech guy like them cause they were free and they make sounds in his ears, or would he actually spend his own $130+ on them. (you bought multiple sets, I'm assuming he got one of them). PLEASE find out asap if the surround sound works at all. If there's no real difference between the surround and stereo, might as well get a set at %50 the cost.

HURRY! This is important!

Posted: **Tue Mar 23, 2010 4:10 pm**

HURRY! This is important!

Like a cabling quote ?

Posted: **Tue Mar 23, 2010 9:50 pm**

?? Wha chu mean? Did you ever do that install?

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 9:46 am**

Broke it out last night, but only did a couple of things as I was distracted by the amazing Kansas State-Xavier game.

The headset is light. Not light as a feather, but it weighs a lot less than the last set I owned. I was also pretty happy with the ear cushions.

Installation was as simple as plugging it in. Drivers installed automatically.

It configures itself in Windows as a 7.1 system. Although, it has a control pad where you can change it to 2D for music with a single button push. That pad also allows for on the fly adjustments to sound, which is perfect for when you're in game, but something sounds bad. Great feature.

The cord is long and seems to be wrapped in fabric of some sort. It has a feel resembling suede.

I tested the 7.1 auto via the control panel and was able to hear the different sounds coming from different directions.

Briefly played Left4Dead 2 and noticed the difference in audio immediately. Didn't play long enough to really see how good it was, but the first thing I noticed was that I'd probably have to make some adjustments.

not sure those adjustments were negative though as I had trouble hearing one of the characters talking when they were behind me, and my gun was loud as hell (which it should be).

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 10:20 am**

Leisher wrote:not sure those adjustments were negative though as I had trouble hearing one of the characters talking when they were behind me, and my gun was loud as hell (which it should be).

With real speakers you can adjust levels of the different channels in case you can't have them at perfect, equal distances.

Perhaps you can increase the pretend rear channels of your head phones so you can hear people behind you.

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 10:23 am**

Perhaps you can increase the pretend rear channels of your head phones so you can hear people behind you.

Yeah, you can. Sorry I did a shitty job of explaining that.

The headset has a control panel (hardware) attached to the cord where you can control everything on the fly.
-One button controls the mode you're in, music (2 speaker) or gaming (7.1).
-Three buttons control mic functions
-One button, a wheel (like on an iPod), and various lights work the rest. Hit the button and it highlights specific speakers, thus you have control over those and can use the wheel to boost or reduce them.

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 1:10 pm**

Also, there are two speakers in each ear thing. So, the rear channels aren't really "pretend".

Buy.com had them on sale for $130 shipped, so I grabbed them. They are light. MUCH lighter than the G35s. But, the ear thing is smaller. So, where my ears fit completely in the G35s, the Razer ear things make contact. Not a major deal, but on a looooong gaming session, I could see it being irritating. My first test was to compare it to the G35s in HL2:E2. I was seeing mostly the same stuff. Couldn't hear certain things unless I was facing them, etc. Then I downloaded the firmware update from Razer. It helped a bit. Not in a major way, but it helped. Instead of not hearing the motor running behind me at all, it was very faint. But, the guy who was talking to me while I had my back turned to him was much louder. So, turning the rear speakers up isn't a good fix because it will make some things way too loud.

Listening to the demo auido clip from Razer, I could hear things 'surroundly'. They had a battle scene playing and you could hear the planes fly from the left rear to the right front. You are driving a vehicle and your machine gunner yells "They're behind us" and you can hear his machine gun firing behind you. However, it was very subtle. Really being able to pick things up from a spacial aweness point will take some practice. But I think it's possible.

What I need to do, it load a game that's actually 7.1 compatible. Even though HL2 has 7.1 options, from what I've read, it doesn't do a very good job of it. Entire channels are dropped based on player orientation and stuff. It's supposed to do 5.1 much better. I'll have to try it in that mode as well. Left 4 Dead 2 and Fallout 3 are supposed to support 7.1 really well. I'm going to load Fallout3 this weekend and give it a try.

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 5:37 pm**

Cakedaddy wrote:Also, there are two speakers in each ear thing. So, the rear channels aren't really "pretend".

It isn't really 7.1 if it only has 4 speakers. That is 4.0. It is simulating 7.1. It is pretend.

Posted: **Fri Mar 26, 2010 7:25 pm**

In your world, that is probably true.

Welcome to Thunderdome

New Headset - Logitech G35