Sennheiser PC360 G4ME Headset Review

Gaming audio is oftentimes a part of the play experience passed off as mehh by some gamers. FPS pros would tell you otherwise. Modern games create the illusion of reality by adding positional audio, ambient noise and mechanical sounds but this not only adds to the dimension and experience. Pros use this auditory information to know where their opponents are, where shots at coming from and where bombs are placed (hint hint). This week we have the Sennheiser PC360 in the lab so let’s get started and let’s make this showy.

Sennheiser is one of the greatest names in the audio industry. They have an awesome lineup of devices aimed at audiophiles, professionals and the everyday guy. Extending their product line-up to the enthusiast market, they’ve taken their years of experience in the audio industry to the PC market. Today we’ll be reviewing one of their offerings in said marketspace in the form of the PC360, an enthusiast targeted headset designed for pro-gaming. With a price-tag that’s sure to scare off a ton of users, we’re here to test if it’s really worth its golden pricetag.

PACKAGING

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First impressions up, the PC360’s box is quite reminiscent of Logitech’s packaging style e.g. dark background with techno lines breaking it up. Main difference is Sennheiser’s usage of embossed and fleer metal accentuations on text and images. Aside from that, packaging is particularly simple with subtle stylings that will attract potential buyers checking out the displays in shops. Upfront we see a large picture of the PC360 with its features highlighted at the upper left as follows:

• Intuitive Controls – I had no idea a volume knob was that complicated
• Pro Mic – professional grade mic so all your trashtalk is crystal
• Open Acoustics – lets you hear the outside world when you’re not pumping tunes
• XXL Comfort –because big headed dudes also deserve comfortable headsets
• Pure HIFI – we’ll know if it really delivers hi-fidelity later
• Pro Gaming – enough justification why we’re reviewing it right

A few spaces below that on the left lines is a block of text that says “perfect for your G4ME music & internet telephone” exactly like that. Yeah, this stuff is some l33t p13c3 oF 3qu!pM3nT. Imagine me writing the entire review like that… no, just no.

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Flipping the box around we see a picture of a guy… but not just any guy, its mTw’s AVE Alexander Holdt. What!!??? You don’t know ‘em? Come on. mTw is a pro-gaming team, one of the world’s best in CS and the PC360 even claims they are THE best. Nuff said.

Moving onwards, the back has a couple of thumbnails showcasing the PC360’s features such as:

• Intuitive Volume Control on Ear Cup – the controls are on the earcup instead of the cord
• Microphone Muted when Boom Arm Up – auto-mute so the judges can’t hear you swear
• XXL Ear Cups for Longer Sessions – because we’re living large
• Adjustable Boom & Pro Mic for Clear Chat – oooh it moves
• Open Design – Keep Your Head Cool – you heard the man, be cool and stop hatin

Just below that are also little icons which enumerate the specs:

• 15-28,000 Hz Frequency Response
• 3M cable length
• 300g weight
• Double sided headband wearing style
• 2 x 3.5mm mic & audio jack

Indicated in the center is a 2-year warranty icon and I’m really glad to see that.

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Top of the box is practically bare with only the product name and the 2-year warranty icon printed on it. Checking out the bottom we see a warning and other details.

INSIDE THE BOX

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The PC360 is housed inside another box with another cardboard assembly holding it in its place. Opening up the package I’m surprised to see that the package only includes one thing: the headset itself. No anything else like manuals, etc. Considering the price of this item, a leather pouch and Velcro ties would’ve been nice since this is such a lovely headset to get scratched up.

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Note: The Velcro strap in the photos is not included in the package. More details later.

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So here we have the PC360. It has a matte black finish and the construction is solid. You’ll feel this once you hold both earcups and start stretching the headband, you’ll know this is one piece of equipment that’d last.

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The PC360 features open acoustic earcups that let air and sound pass through. This will effectively allow you to hear the outside world when the volume is set low enough or when no sound is coming out although set at high enough volume, those around you will hear the sounds coming from it. As air can also pass through it is quite cooler than say the Banshee with its closed-off construction.

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Examining the microphone boom, first impression is its very long and wider than typical headset booms. It’s also the only part in a glossy finish with part of the shaft in rubber to allow adjustment.

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The headband flaunts the Sennheiser logo and is lined with soft cushion that resembles velvet.

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The earcup also feature the same soft velvety cushions in the headband. The earcups can be adjusted to significant lengths and have a bit of tilt to them allowing more perfect fit to all head sizes. The volume knob can be found on the right earcup with the mic boom and cord on the left.

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The PC360’s cable is really amazing. Versus braided cables, I really prefer what Sennheiser has. It’s a soft, lightweight cable that does not retain shape. The cable is always straight and when tied for long times, it will still stretch out fine. Capping off the cable are 2 baby audio jacks plated in gold for clean signal transmission.

PERFORMANCE

Methodology:

As stated in our previous headset review, sound is a really hard category to rate. We try our best to be as scientific as possible by putting the test sample in various real world applications and see how it performs based on personal taste. We do try to make our views as fair as possible so we pay close attention to what people usually look for in any headset: clarity and power.

To fully bring out our test samples power, we brought out some heavy equipment in the form of the Lexicon Omega professional audio device for all our tests.

Listening and Music

First round: A couple of random tracks at varying bitrates and compression formats.

• 4minute – Hot Issue (Instrumental) [320Kbps CBR MP3]

An instrumental heavily lined with synths and bass, the PC360 easily handles the rapid changes in the music whilst steadily delivering the amount of bass I’m used to

• 4minute – Heart to Heart [1152Kbps FLAC]

I wanted to test out if I can see who’s autotuned on this song since it’s got parts which are purely vocal with only dual-layering. All in all, the the PC360 gave the song a very realistic, close feel with the melody smoothly flowing in the background. This demonstrates the PC360’s ability to produce sounds that easily get distorted by higher frequencies.

• D-Coy – I Love Haterz [256Kbps CBR MP3]

I was present during a recording take of this song in the booth so I’m really particular on how the PC360 delivers this track. The beat on this track brings a good balance of kicks and melody with D-coy’s excellent vocal delivery weaving together a verbal smackdown on them haters. YOU HATIN? STOP HATIN!!! Blend your own bacon. Anyways, its either I’m expecting way high bass or the PC360 just doesn’t deliver bass as much as I want to. Still, it does perfectly on the vocals and music giving that feeling of realism to the recording.

• Ayumi Hamasaki – M [DVD]

Subtle track with nice transitions of soft tones to high powered vocals. This track had a particular open space feel to it and with the PC360’s excellent rendering of vocals and soft tones. I’m used to it having a bit of concert hall feel to it but I’ve seen to now prefer the PC360’s more natural delivery of the song.

• Dream Evil – Chasing the Dragon [192Kbps MP3]

Heavy metal track of high energy guitar riffs. The PC360 added great feel to this song increasing the story-telling lyrics’ realism. It had great rendering of the riffs adding a bit more dimension and depth to the song.

Music-wise, the PC360 is one excellent performer. Capturing and adding more life to the mid to higher range sounds whilst still packing some bass to add that thump to your listening experience. Great performance here though bass-heads might wanna play around with their EQ settings to get a better bass experience. Or just turn the volume way up.

Movie and Video

Stepping into movies and video performance we load up The A-Team in Blu-ray and jump to 1:34:29. That’s where the fireworks start to fly.

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The PC360 delivers yet again, fully providing great positional audio giving the illusion of those flying cargo containers really coming at the viewer. I’ve got nothing else to say, just superb. Yeah that’s it… this stuff’s really good. I won’t really go into much detail here since this isn’t really the purpose of this headset but it still goes to show how well-rounded this particular one is.

Gaming

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Mission: WMD

Like what Mr. ave of mTw says on the box: “hearing when your opponent is before you can see him is key in professional gaming” and he’s absolutely right.

This particular mission starts out as a stealth-op but gets into full-blown shoot everything. The opening part also allows you to command Hudson and his squad via a B52 console. Moving on to the PC360’s performance I really gotta say I’m very impressed with it. It beautifully renders the ambient sound which really impresses. I’m particularly critical about audio realism and how it adds depth to games and any good piece of hardware will do justice to the developer’s effort but a great piece of hardware will simply take that to a new level. The PC360 delivers nicely on the dialogs and other effects notably the flashbang and its high pitched whine.

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One of 2011’s highly anticipated games, Crysis 2 takes the fight from the pacific jungles to the urban jungle of NYC. This game features excellent sound effects amongst its numerous game-changing standards.

Just watching the intro movie of the Nanosuit in action you will immediately appreciate the excellent sounds the game has and the PC360 easily translates those into a great experience. In-game, the audio is just superior. Like with the music category of this review, I still was looking for more bass on the PC360 since Crysis 2 has events featuring tons of explosion and catastrophic urban destruction featuring falling bridges and other large structures. The aliens high-pitched sounds render well with the nanosuit sound effects getting the same treatment.  Positional audio is really useful along with the tactical visor giving the player superb feel of the game environment.

Conclusion

Before we close things up, I have to point out that this is one of the most expensive game-oriented headsets I have ever encountered. Due to this, I was under the impression that it’d work fine with internal audio and that’s where I was wrong. You’ll be needing a pretty decent audio card that can deliver a bit more power than your typical integrated setup. Unless you’re gunning a G1 Killer, it is advised that you pair this headset with a good sound card if you haven’t got one already. As for the integrated audio experience, it lacked the power that the PC360 can deliver. To test this out, DJ Logik’s audio testing suite of tracks which feature 20hz -20,000hz audio samples. The PC360 performed fairly on the mids and highs but the bass left a lot to be desired. So before you decide to get one of this, make sure you have the right stuff to complement the PC360.

Closing things off, the PC360 is one superior piece of audio hardware as expected of Sennheiser products. I know I’m starting to sound repetitive but you the saying “you gotta hear to believe it” really applies here… or was that see it. Getting back, its audio delivery creates a sound experience that is nothing short of remarkable. I really can’t say anything to ask for or improve on this headset, maybe a removable mic boom, some extra accessories like a leather pouch and cable ties but aside from that, nothing else can be wanted from this headset. Its solid construction and solid frame hides the fact that this is one light headset, easily adding points for comfort which is something that really adds to the value of it. If you can wear one for a long time and not feel hindered or have neck pains then you’ve got a very comfortable unit right there. The cushions used also add to the comfort with the earcups featuring total sound isolation when in use and allowing hearing of the outside world when not in use. All this goodness is backed by a 2 year warranty which is a nice assurance.

So is it worth the price? The PC360 averages for around $270, a price-range usually reserved by most for their motherboards or GPUs. Other products are also offered way below this price range, some offering surround audio. I personally would recommend this headset for the enthusiast with a larger budget for their equipment or those playing pro. Its lightweight and comfort is a great asset in long gaming sessions while its excellent performance not only gives the player the extra advantage but also provides a totally immersive audible experience in games, music and voice chat. Those looking for a new headset and are on a tight budget might want to look into other offerings but it would be quite hard to find something like the PC360. Another advice would be to start playing pro, rack up those prize money, get famous and you just might have your face on the box of the next PC3xx release.

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