Gadgetory

Linus tech tips coverage of CES 2014 is brought to you by NCI XCOM your source for great technology selection and service along with Corsair memory and Western Digital we're gonna kick off our Sennheiser booth tour with a look at their game series headsets now they did make a bit of a mistake here they they spelled game wrong they're like German or something so maybe spelling in English isn't a strong point but designing headsets is so we're going to start with the game one if you've ever used an HD 500 series headphone in the last little while these will probably look familiar they've got cloth padding they have sort of a it's a soft but not memory foam style padding the drivers inside them are actually very similar to 500 series drivers but they've made a couple small tweaks to enhance things like sound effects as well as dialogue in games without completely destroying the sound signature because Sennheiser does know a thing or two about not destroying the sound signature on their products they have also updated the ID so they've got kind of a white glossy design that's quite beautiful looking with a red metallic accent colour that goes around certain parts of it they've got a self muting microphone so you've got to do is lower that to get it to work and then raise it to get it to stop transmitting and then finally to make it a gaming headset they of course have a volume control knob on the other ear now this is the lower end of the tool though both of them cost over $200 but this one right here is the one that I think many gamers will find quite interesting where the game one uses an open back design meaning that sound tends to leak both in and out which is not the greatest thing for immersion personally I prefer open back just because it does give a bit more of a natural feeling to the sound I think many gamers will be looking for the game one so this uses a closed back design they've got sort of a pleather synthetic leather cover on the ear cups this enhances the noise isolation as well as being more comfortable for certain people although I personally do prefer cloth it also has a memory foam design for both the ear cups and for the headband and as you can see that happened while I was sitting you're holding it it has nice swiveling ear cups so you can easily hang around your neck as well as a folding design so you can pack it up and take it with you wherever you go now both of these headsets use standard three-and-a-half millimeter jacks which is great for PC gamers because with the way that sound card technology has advanced in the last little while even on just integrated oh I just turned on those speakers because I unplugged this anyway even with onboard sound I don't see a particular reason why you would need a USB interface unless you you know really had some special effects you wanted to apply to it but the good news about it is that with this simple little adapter you've got not only PC compatibility but also PlayStation 4 compatibility out of the box this adapter is going to come at about $14.99 it'll be available in a little while however you know even though we're standing in Sennheiser's booth I'll tell you guys there's nothing particularly special about it it's a four pool two dual three pole adapter you can pick these up almost anywhere and boom you're ready to go on your PC or on your Playstation with either of these games series headsets we've got three significant updates to send Heiser's pro series products and I'll start with what they all have in common they all come with a professional-grade hard case that's actually super super nice it's got gorgeous hard foam inside I wouldn't be worried about damaging these at all they both come they all come there are actually three models they all come with two sets of ear cups you whether you prefer more of a pleather feel or whether you want something that's a velour which is a little bit different from the traditional cloth ear cup that you'll find on headphones because it will tend to help with noise isolation a little bit more than a very very breathable cloth they all come with detachable cables which you can actually plug into either side so if you have mixing equipment that tends to sit more off to your left and you don't want the cable coming up that side that's going to be no problem for you and they all come with both a straight cable and with a coiled cable the last thing that they all include is of course robust rugged build quality although one of them is a little bit ahead of the others in terms of that space then we've got the hd7 DJ an HD 8 DJ the key differences between these two are that the hd7 DJ tends to have a little bit of a brighter sound at the high end and has a metal and plastic construction other than that they are lower impedance then the hd6 mix so 95 ohms it can be used on pretty much anything and they both have is this is a first for Sennheiser check this out guys they've got a swiveling ear cup design that has three distinctly locking positions so you can position them directly over the ear a little bit kind of half off the year or way up there so they sit on the head in a comfortable manner while being completely out of the way now I'd like to move on to the HD 8 DJ this one features an all-metal construction so it has some additional robustness to go along with the while DJ optimized sound signature so that is to say that unlike the hd6 mix these ones are fairly fairly more neutrally except in bass so they're going to be able to pound the bass and they're going to be able to pound it hard they're both capable of delivering up to a hundred and fifteen decibels of high-quality sound to your ear which is something that I wouldn't necessarily recommend doing but hey if you're in a loud Club and you've got to hear what you're working on then I guess you don't really have much of a choice so thanks for checking out our sennheiser booth coverage guys don't miss any of our coverage of CES 2014 by making sure you're subscribed and just as a reminder our trip to the show is powered by NCI XCOM your source for great technology selection and service as well as Western Digital and course our memory a huge thanks to those guys because we wouldn't be able to be here without them