SteelSeries H Wireless Review
The SteelSeries H Wireless is a wireless gaming headset with 7.1 surround sound. This headset is compatible with PC, XBOX 360, and Playstation 3, with likely Playstation 4 support.
Combining a gaming headset, a surround sound experience, and wireless capability makes for the perfect formula for me. But did the headset live up to my standards?
Build Quality
The SteelSeries H Wireless is a very rugged, durable feeling device.
The transmitter features a volume knob and a back button, power port, mini USB connection port, analog audio in and out, as well as optical audio in and out ports.
The headset features a battery under the left ear cap, a mini USB connection under the right ear port, a power and mic mute button on the right ear and a XBOX 360 chat out and "Share" port for hooking another pair of headphones up to the same sound source.
My favorite feature of the physical device is the microphone. It's a bendy, repositionable microphone which features a red LED indicator to indicate when the microphone is muted. Best of all? It slides up into the ear hub! You read correctly; when you're not using the microphone, you can slide it up into the headset so it doesn't take up room or risk breaking.
A wireless transmitter and a headset make up the bundle you get with this purchase. The headset itself features a rubber grip along the top band of the headset with "SteelSeries" and their logo engraved in the rubber. The primary material that makes up the headset is a very heavy, rugged plastic.
Ear Cups on the headset as well as the top band's padding are covered in a nice, comfortable leather, or pleather (or some sort of leather-esque material) with a perfect amount of cushioning beneath the pads. This headset holds a great balance of weight support across the top of the skull and pressure on the ears which helps keep it from becoming uncomfortable to wear even for hours of gameplay.
The cap covers which hide the battery and USB port (for running the headset wired) are a very thick plastic, but they have reflective surfaces which tend to hold fingerprints and muck very easily. I was disappointed in that.
On the transmitter, the buttons and volume knob are both very tough feeling and the screen is great.
The transmitter has a rubber pad on the bottom so it can stay in one place without sliding around too much - even when quickly turning the volume knob or hitting buttons. Unfortunately, the sides of the transmitter also have the reflective surface that holds fingerprints as well. I never appreciate this kind of plastic surfacing.
I also experienced an unfortunate event in which I broke out the frame and flap that holds the optical cable in the optical audio out port.
SteelSeries have worked out to provide me a replacement headset and transmitter so I can still make use of the optical audio passthrough, and the person I spoke with said they'd never had that happen before.
I don't doubt that. I had it tightly integrated into my setup in a position where the optical cable running from it did not have enough slack and all it took was one small shift and I broke the port. I'm disappointed that this happened given how easy it is to unplug optical audio cables, but I don't expect that to happen to many other users.
Wireless
The wireless capabilities of the SteelSeries H Wireless are everything I hoped for, and more.
Despite being wireless and battery powered, this headset sounds just as good, powerful and loud as most wired headsets. In fact, compared to the past two USB wired headsets I've tried out prior to this, the H Wireless was actually louder. I was impressed by this.
I experienced a decent wireless range of about 20-35 feet from the transmitter, depending on what was between myself and it. I was able to go through most of my house without losing signal, but it would occasionally cut out. I was even able to sit below my room in the basement and still listen to what I had playing on my computer.
Instead of the signal slowly cutting out, getting weaker, or anything like that, it just cuts out. So you have a strangely fine line between having a perfect-sounding signal and no signal at all. I found this strange, but given the range I don't see it as a big deal.
The wireless capabilities of the SteelSeries H Wireless make it ideal for any setup in which you're in the same room as your audio source, or a quick run to the kitchen or bathroom without audio interruption.
I noticed no sound quality degradation or interference as a result of the audio being transmitted wirelessly. In a blind test, you wouldn't know it was wireless.
To further prevent audio feed interruption, the H Wireless comes with two battery packs that can be easily swapped out. The batteries charge in the transmitter, so when one starts dying (and it beeps at you to alert you to that) you simply need to pop it in the transmitter to charge and put the new one in. This is very convenient and has worked perfectly for me so far.
Battery life is no problem with these battery packs. I am able to use the headset almost non-stop all day without the battery dying on me.
Sound
This headset sounds amazing. As long as the Dolby Digital encoding is disabled. (Yes, that's what I said.)
For context, I primarily used this headset on my gaming and video production PC with a Creative Sound Blaster Z sound card via optical connection. (I also had my DVR, PS3, XBOX 360 and PS2 hooked up via optical switch, but I primarily focused on PC usage.) I tested this with PC games with 5.1 surround enabled, music, and various media files for TV shows and films with both 5.1 encoded and stereo audio, as well as BluRay discs. Since my sound card automatically adjusts how many channels it transmits based on the source streams I play, keeping the H Wireless transmitter's Dolby Digital encoding turned off resulted in a great surround sound experience.
Using the Dobly Digital encoding results in a weird audio duplication effect which I've experienced with most virtual surround setups I've used, such as the Logitech G430 headset. However, since this headset supports actual optical digital audio sources, the natural surround sound experience is quite nice.
For gaming, music, and movies - this headset is fantastic. As I mentioned previously, this headset actually sounds quite a bit louder and more powerful than wired USB-powered headsets I've used in the past, so it can handle anything.
The microphone's sound quality, however, is not good at all. Sadly, this is standard for gaming headsets outside of Audio Technica's headset, but it disappoints me nonetheless. The microphone does the job of getting a loud voice transmission across gameplay for multiplayer chat, but for any normal microphone use, this one certainly falls short.
Please, headset manufacturers, include better microphones. Please.
Minor Concern
A minor concern I had about the headset is one that I've had with any headset that uses USB power in any way. Most headsets I've used and experienced this with were powered directly by USB connection to a console or computer, and I saw this as the cause of the issue. However, this headset uses a USB to wall power adapter to get its power and I still experience this problem.
Static, electrical hissing.
This has plagued amplified gaming headsets since the beginning, I'm afraid, but given that this headset is capable of being louder than most I've used, that means the hissing and various electrical noises are, too.
Thankfully, this is not at all noticeable when you have audio playing through the headset. It's just not there. However, when audio stops, it's there. The hissing will randomly start or stop for no apparent reason, and can be temporarily resolved by unplugging the data USB connection and plugging it back in. This does, of course, reset your drivers for the device so you would lose chat connection if you were using the headset while doing so.
This is a minor concern, and present in most gaming headsets, but one I feel the need to point out nonetheless.
Conclusion
Overall, while being a bit pricey, this headset is the ultimate solution. I was about ready to give up on using headsets in my setup due to issues keeping up with the wires. Thankfully, the SteelSeries H Wireless has renewed my interest in premium headsets.
This headsets works perfectly as a wireless gaming headset, has a fantastic surround sound experience if you set it up correctly, features chat live mixing on PC, XBOX 360, and PS3, and sounds amazing. The microphone could use a bit of work, but most of its competitors aren't any better off.
You can purchase the SteelSeries H Wireless here.