Corsair Vengeance 1300 Circumaural Analog Gaming Headset

It is billed for "Intensive Gaming with Audiophile Quality", this is not true. It is definiately geared towards gamers and is great for that purpose. Listening to music however is a different story.

First the good things. I am no audiophile, but it appears to have good high and mid range reproduction. I can tell that the large drivers are making a difference when compaired to my girlfriend's headset in that the sound is clear and crisp. There is no distortion to speak of and I can pick out all the various sounds easily. The large ear cups fit around my large ears very comfortably. Further the cups blockout a lot of background noise; which is great as they are doing construction outside my window and I can't hear it isn't distracting at all.

The build quality seems very sturdy. Most of it appears plastic, but how the adjustment mechanism feels and the stiffness of the headband lead me to believe that there is a metal core. The leather covers are nice and breathe well.

The microphone is very clear. It doesn't pick up much background noise, even screening out the fan I have behind me. The boom sits a good distance away to make it easy for voice-activation to work in Ventrillo.

The one problem I have with these headphones is that the low-end performance is poor. I have some cheap skullcandy earbuds that do a far better job at bass than these do. As I'm used to playing with a sub and through better earbuds I feel as if I'm missing a major component. The clarity and quality of the mid and high range make up for this failure a little, but not enough. Given the price of these headphones coupled with the huge bottom range missing I can't give these 4 stars even though they perform very well otherwise.

The headband is a little tight, but this could be that I have a big head. The tightness combined with the weight can lead to fatigue after an hour or two gaming. Other people who are used to such headsets might be fine with this.

Overall, I am dissappointed, the lack of bass support makes me very sad. I wouldn't recommend them. However, for gaming on vent, phone calls and other communication based tasks they are wonderful. The sound isolation and the quality of what sound it does play makes me feel like I got my money's worth, but that maybe they (or I) could've done better.