On the dawn of a new decade, sound and audio technology is another area of technology that will continue to evolve slowly with high-resolution audio (HRA) and new developments with lossless media codecs. For providing a recommendation of upgrading your headset for possibly the next decade, we’ll reveal our top gaming headsets of 2021 and compare each one as far as advantages to disadvantages.
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Jeeco/Xiberia V20 Gaming Headset
Starting off with a budget friendly gaming headset, the Jeecoo/XIBERIA V20 Gaming Headset is one headset that most of the “Minecraft Kids” like and is considered the lightest headset on our top 3 list weighing in at 9.5 ounces. The durability of this headset is consistent with the heavy duty plastic design in combination of the comfort of the foam earmuffs make this headset one to wear for hours. The Xiberia V20 headset is adjustable and can be extended 2 to 3cm extra to make the headset extend out to around 22cm.
For noise cancellation, the sound quality behind it is satisfactory; but, the 3cm thick foam earmuffs formed to each of the 50 mm “egg shape” speakers helped seals the headset to block out outside noises and improves on hearing any background noises in-game.
The 16cm omnidirectional microphone on the headset is adjustable and can be angled up to a 100 degree range making it up to the user to adjust to liking (it is recommended to have a pop filter put on the mic though to prevent voice cracking).
The best part about the XIBERIA V20 headset is despite it having a capability of outputting 7.1 Surround Sound, it has an additional capability where the surround sound can be shifted and positioned differently through the XEar Surround desktop application giving this headset some customization.
Additionally to the software this headset uses, there is an in-line sound controller that can be used to adjust the chat to in-game sound ratio make it somewhat easier for the user to find the right sound balance and this sound controller is where the mute button will be instead of on the headset located on the left or right driver.
The LED’s on each side of the ear muffs detail a rainbow color and unfortunately the LED color cannot be changed to a color that you may want to have illuminated, not even a 3rd application can change this color. Also, the LED can only illuminate when plugging the headset via the USB cord into either a 2.0 or 3.0 port
The other downside to this headset is that it requires a Microsoft TRS adapter in order to be used with the XBOX One consoles in order for the headset to work; but, other consoles including the Nintendo switch do not require any adapter in order to work.
HyperX Cloud Stinger Headset
Weighing in at 9.8 ounces, the HyperX Cloud Stinger Gaming Headset makes our top 3 list at #2 as another lightweight headset to wear for hours without making your ears bleed in pain or make your neck go stiff.
As one of the main features, the HyperX Cloud Stinger headset can be folded at 90 degrees to be worn around your neck if needing to give your ears a break.
Unlike the Jeeco/XIBERIA V20 headset, the HyperX Cloud Stinger headset has a steel headband adjuster that can extend and adjust upwards of 2.5cm in case you have a big head…or in other cases are an “egg head.” Just Kidding!
The main construction of this headset allows the ear muffs to be folded at a 90 degree angle if you want to rest the headset around the neck and the microphone is more fixed; but, can be bent up to automatically mute the microphone rather than pushing a button found somewhere on the headset or on the in-line controller.
Just like the Jeeco/XIBERIA V20 headset, the ear muff drivers are 50mm in size and can be fitted to have 7.1 Surround Sound.
The HyperX Cloud Stinger is considered another budget friendly headset eventhough customization is not as important with this headset.
SteelSeries Arctis Pro HD Headset
Moving to #1 in our top 3 gaming headsets list and still considered to be one of our most favorite gaming headset brands is the SteelSeries Arctis Pro HD Gaming Headset that is an upgrade from our previous experiment with the SteelSeries Arctis 5 headset mentioned in a previous countdown list.
One of the customization features on the SteelSeries Arctis Pro HD Headset is the Prism Lighting Illumination rings that can be customized from 16.5 million colors to a number of effects to meet any gamers need and of course style.
Still keeping with the same construction and basically the same design as the previous Arctis models, the SteelSeries Arctis Pro headset uses the upgraded DTX v2 7.1 Next Gen Surround Sound technology to one-up the age of surround sound as newer AAA games improve audio technology for in-game.
The DTX v2 Surround Sound gives this headset a whooping 40,000 hertz that is 2x better than most other surround headsets that only put about close to 20,000 hertz.
This headset still features the same USB-C ChatMix Dial box to balance out in-game chat with the in-game background sounds…this box can be a pain if you disconnect it during some games since you would have to manually disconnect/reconnect the headphones again from the sound settings if running on PC in order to regain audio.
The best part of the SteelSeries Arctis headsets including the Pro HD version is the sound can be engineered to finer detail through the SteelSeries Engine Software to customize everything from the different equalizer, side-tone, sound reduction, and the LED settings to make the headset sound how you want it to down to the last detail.
Unfortunately, this Engine software is really too advanced if you don’t understand some of the settings that sound engineers make in getting the sound right. So, if one of these sounds is not correct then game audio could be set too much to tremble or to the bass frequency ends.
