Arguably one of the most important pieces of a competitive gamer’s kit is the headset. It gives a greater audio depth, and enables isolation and immersion for full in-game concentration. But, shouldn’t headsets do more for gamers? Shouldn’t they provide the gamer with a wide range of audio accuracy to allow for a more dynamic range of audio activities? Cue the Corsair Vengeance 1300.

Quote from Corsair

The Corsair Vengeance 1300 is designed for enthusiasts and gamers who own a high-quality soundcard, and want to partner it with a headset that is equally high-quality, and that delivers precise audio in games, and music and movies too. Based on the award-winning Corsair HS1A headset, the Vengeance 1300 delivers improved sound quality, thanks to refinements to the acoustic design, and a more aggressive look that makes it – and you – stand out from the crowd.

Out the box, the headset looks mean. The aggressive aesthetics will show anyone that you mean business, but understand style. One of the first things I noticed was the braided cable. Like most electrical consumers, I have been plagued with exposed wires from poorly constructed plastic casing, and broken connections from general wear and tear. Not only is the braided cable strong and flexible, but it adds a bit of texture to the very smooth look of the headset.

The design is not just to please the eye. The, quite frankly, huge ear cups hold recessed baffles, which house 50mm drivers and big memory-foam ear pads designed to seal your ears away from external noise while maintaining comfort. For those of you who aren’t tech-savvy with audio equipment, baffles are used to house the driving speakers in a way to best direct the audio output. “The baffles are also recessed inside the ear cup and carefully orientated so that they are aligned with the ear canal when the headset is worn”, say Corsair, to aid 3D audio processing - an obvious advantage in the gaming market. 

The combination of this optimized baffle geometry, with the 50mm drivers, definitely works. The sound quality is incredible, and much better than I expected. All the different frequencies, from rumbling bass to high treble come through sharply; multiple loud explosions from your game will not get in the way of your teammate’s voices. It is, however, largely dependant on the sound card. Most gamers would rather spend money on the latest performance hardware, or increasingly expensive LAN tickets, than a replacement for motherboard-bundled sound. Which is fine, most motherboards from the past 2 or so years have provided very decent audio processing capabilities. That being said, motherboard sound processing will probably still bottleneck the headset.

You are expected to tune the graphic equalizer to your taste, which is a daunting task for the average user. But you would be forgiven if you stayed clear of the plethora of settings and techniques, as the headset will give it’s best, most accurate frequency response on a flat modulation.

The microphone is on par with the audio quality. It’s on a rotating boom, it’s noise cancelling and unidirectional. Which, in simple terms, means it will take sound in from one direction (your voice), the rest (background noise) will be subtracted from the input and the result, in theory, is a reproduction of only your voice. And it does work very well; people on voice communication applications like Skype, Mumble and Teamspeak 3 couldn't hear any background noise, regardless of source, and received a very lifelike representation of my voice.

Unfortunately, it isn’t the most comfortable headset in the world. The huge ear cups and drivers which give it such an acoustical advantage, make the headset very heavy. The headband, although very padded, is tight on the head. The active pushing from it, presumably to keep the memory-foam sealed round your ears, can get tiresome after a few hours and the weight will build neck muscles rivaled only by Michael Schumacher. It doesn’t take long to get used to it, after my second day of use I hardly noticed it. Although it took my better half a bit longer, she was comfortable enough after a few days. Is that what you really want though? With this price range, and this audio quality, it’s definitely worth the extra effort.

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