can anyone recommend a very good gaming headset?

[Stublerone]

I jist can say, that I had a couple of headsets and some months ago, after researching several days on gaming pages and also on hifi forums concerning headsets and soundcards, I am now very confident to make suggestions.

Anybody who got deep into the topic soon gets to know, that:

1.) 5.1 headsets have no advantage in locating sounds ingame. The opposite is the case as more sound drivers for the ear needs more calibration (depending on your ears shape) to make it as accurate as hifi headphones or headsets, where u just have 1 driver for each ear. The headfi forum is a well established community of sound loving guys. Mainly for hearing music, but u can also find topics for headsets. These guys and the industry as well say, that it is just a blender feature to sell new products. Nevertheless the sound of a 5.1 headset mixes up, before it reaches your ear. So it is inaccurate. Professional players play with stereo headsets, although they support 5.1 headsets. The sponsoring money makes it possible. 5.1 -» blender, a stereo is more accurate.

2.) Headsets can have a good microphone and it has the advantage, that it is mounted to the earphone. So it is handy and you can place it very well, where it is needed. -» advantage for a headset!

3.) Bill of material: The main parts of a headet are very often very cheap. Especially the drivers are a problem. I remember, that there was one headaet with a driver similar to a quite good headphone, but I do not remember the name. But in general you can say, that very much headsets with all its plasric parts and cheap technical parts are often way to expensive. -»c clear disadvantage

Finally I came to the result, that I should try a hifi headphone and an additional microphone instead of a headset. My personal preference is after all these years of extensive playing as follows:

Buy a headphone. I have an old akg headphone, which was very unconfortable to wear and I bought a beyerdynamic dt880 (perhaps to expensive for some), which is awesome in soundstage, immersive bass (not to much but with high resolution) and comfort. Now, I recently had a driver issue and haf to send it back for repairing. So I had to stick with the old akg and found out, that it also sound great (this headphone is about 50 eur nowadays. So you can see, that a headphone don't need to be that expensive.

I added a normal zalman clip microphone for 4 eur and it has the same sound quality than good headset microphones. It works as good as it with a very little disadvantage in noise cancelling, because u cannot locate it directly to your mouth and calibrate it.

My advice in short: If you want a competitive headset , which can be compared to a 80 EUR headphone +microphone, you have to pay about double price or more.

If you additionally buy a headphone amp or a soundcard like asus essence stx with a built in amp for headphones, the sound for our gaming needs cannot be better for the money.

Seeing the headsets currently on the market, I will always stick with my headphone + microphone combo!

BTW: To get better and better sound, I spent roughly 600,- EUR for headsets again and again with low improvements. Now, it is simply great and I have no longer any excuse, why I located wrong. It will be my personal fault and not the inaccuracy of my sound.