Gadgetory

hey guys this is Dimitri with hurricane axe and welcome back to another review on the table today we've got a gaming headset from Steel series this is the five hv3 retailing for around $80 I think this headset is unique in the sense that it dismantles into three parts which is awesome for travel it packs a very simplistic and compact footprint plus you can put it back together without connecting any wires and so SteelSeries sure made this process very simple ironically I do however think that this three-piece design is bound to make some customers unhappy solely because there are now more points of failure and the joints just don't feel as robust as with a single piece headphone also coming from personal experience and many user reviews online this three-piece design doesn't prove reliable for connectivity resulting in one of the ear cups to stop working now with that said the plastic construction has its benefits as the headset is extremely lightweight I had absolutely no issues with several hours of use specs wise this house 40 millimeter drivers with a decent frequency range and impedance of 40 ohms and sensitivity of 110 DB which is perfectly loud alright so coming on to microphone qualities you can hear it sounds very nice very loud very clear and it manages to isolate my voice from background noises so it says perfect solution for in game volume yeah I like the fact that this microphone is flexible and has a very small footprint on the headphone itself and you can just stow it away easily and conveniently inside the headphone just like this you can hear it still picking up my voice and that's why we have the new mic mute button on the volume control on the wire and moving on to the ear cushions they are removable unfortunately we don't get any replacement ear pads but still series does carry open style cushions that open on the soundstage just a little bit but the stock pleather cups of course concentrate the heat so you will need to vent your ears once in a while but they do provide excellent sound isolation and produce almost no leak which is perfectly if you want to maintain your privacy I also appreciate the small details like the single orange thread outline to match the internal lining the headband is also quite soft and it is small and putting these on I do find them quite comfortable because of the lightweight soft ear pants and an overall nice fit with the adjustable headband on the cable we have volume knob and the mic mute button and has the usual 3.5 millimeter headphone jacks now you are able to disconnect the dual jack and put an angled headphone jack that is included to be used with portable devices and this connectivity is quite tight so I wouldn't expect any issues with the detachable cable at least in the beginning of the lifespan now overall the build quality is okay but it does feel fragile in the hands particularly because the detachable joints and for $80 it's a bit of a disappointment alright now on to the most interesting part of the review here comes the audio quality and as always I let them burn in for 48 hours with white noise and fire them up with some of my favorite so I know exactly what to listen for and I tested these with mic so nerdy X 7.1 channel sound card first impressions for an 80 dollar gaming headphone were a little mixed for one I missed a deep bass that makes explosions and powerful gunfire that much more powerful the bass doesn't overpower and is quite detailed but it doesn't deliver to that punchy standard we've come to expect from gaming headsets man perhaps maybe that's a good thing as many times all we hear is the bass that destroys the fidelity of the sound the lower based on the 5 hv3 is completely missing I wasn't impressed and dubstep tracks really did not come to life plus playing with equalizer to move the bass slightly forward introduced a lot of unpleasant distortion so the 40 millimeter drivers really don't shine in the lower range the mid-tones were a little less disappointing they aren't particularly muddy and actually quite detailed but they are recessed and sound quite hollow that didn't impress when listening to my favourite tracks it's a similar story with the highs is they are detailed and bring the vocals forward which is excellent for in-game voice the highs are more emphasized and is the best part throughout the range I didn't manage to improve the detail in the mid-range using the equalizer on my sound card but playing around with the bass was impossible due to introduced distortion of course taking into account the pricing of the headset I wasn't expecting amazing sound quality but one thing that was really not happy with was stereo imaging if you want to be completely aware of your surroundings and where those footsteps are coming from you'll be disappointed and this is mainly due to a very small soundstage playing battlefield 4 things came through clearly but I did miss powerful and deep bass that makes you smile when you fire rocket for example the atmosphere and Metro last light is outstanding for post-apocalyptic environment and the 5hv 3 wasn't capable of providing that immersive feeling it really does lack appropriate soundstage so the 5hv 3 is a decent headset considering the compact nature of the design a very comfortable fit with noise isolating ear pads and the retractable mic is a bonus to keeping up with a minimalistic footprint clarity throughout the headset was plenty detailed but not without issues I really wanted more emphasis on deeper bass and better stereo imaging for directionality as detecting precise positioning of incoming footsteps was very difficult and I wouldn't recommend this if you play competitively the three-piece design while compact is also the turning point for build quality as the headset feels very fragile and for of $80 it is still quite expensive considering it's not particularly good for music nor in-game directionality and I think still series should really focus on improving the build quality on their three-piece headphones as aside from disappointing sound quality this old plastic construction would be my biggest critique now would you guys consider this three-piece design useful for travel and would you rather see a collapsible headphone leave you comments down below subscribe for more similar content and as always we'll see you in the next one