Audio-Technica ATH-AG1X review: A good gaming headset with one killer flaw - foremanalaingleuted99

Do a search for the best gaming headset, and you'll see a common refrain pop up in forums: "Father't buy a gaming headset. They're overpriced food waste! Drop your money on a full pair of headphones and a standalone mike from a reputable company instead."

But reputable companies do make their possess gaming headsets. I decided to investigate if these would be any improved than the offerings from companies like Logitech, Corsair, and Razer. In this first cycle of examen, I looked at the Sennheiser's latest Game Zero and GSP 350 models, and Audio-Technica's ATH-AG1X.

Of them, the ATH-AG1X is the most expensive, at an large $300. For that price, you can get wireless headphones, but this particular set of cans is fully tense. And unluckily, it's not quite able to justify its price.

This review is part of our roundupof prizewinning gaming headsets . Go there for details on competing products and how we tested them.

Space eld design

The name "ATH-AG1X" befits a spaceship, and so Audio-Technica's design is suitably futuristic. While floating headbands are pretty common among gaming headsets, the AG1X has no headband. At all.

Rather it has what Audio-Technica refers to as "wings," two flaps that close up in from the sides and pillow against your channelize.

Hayden Dingman / IDG

IT is bizarre.

Audio frequency-Technica does use this design for other headsets—you'll find it along the company's 700X and 900X models. Then the AG1X has some of the corresponding issues as its predecessors: It just seems sandy.

Whether that's actually the incase is hard to say. I experienced negligible movement when I put the AG1X on, moved my head noncurrent and forth, and tilted forward and back. That suggests the AG1X fits tighter than I think.

But it did tend to slip devour and breathe on the tops of my ears afterward 15 to 20 minutes, forcing me to constantly conform the headset game upwardl. I also recovered myself continually worrying about it. The selfsame system meant to alleviate blackmail and make me more leave I was wearing the headset did exactly the opposite. I was preoccupied with what the headset was doing at some given moment.

Hayden Dingman / IDG

Many another 700X and 900X owners have modified the wings with a rubber stripe to sacrifice it a snugger fit—it's a hack to look into, if you're planning to buy the AG1X. I have a fairly large foreland and still felt like I needed the modern.

I'll give Audio-Technica credit, though. The AG1X has the lightest fit I've ever felt from a headset—still lighter than the freehanded HyperX Cloud. If you can mystify the tenseness dialed in properly and eliminate concerns about slippage, it'd No doubt be extremely prosperous for hours connected death. Even for people who wear spectacles.

As for the rest of the design, it's slick. It uses the gamer-standard red-and-black colour scheme, and branding is stripped (just a single Sound-Technica logo on each ear). The microphone isn't clastic, but it's slinky and bendable, and thus less indiscreet than those on some other models. You can sort of hide it against the left earcup.

Hayden Dingman / IDG

The AG1X's one disastrous blueprint flaw is the cable. It's stiff, with a sleazy-feeling inline manipulate boxwood that has a mic on/sour slider and extraordinary of those microscopic volume wheels tucked on the side. Worse, the cable system isn't detachable, and it terminates on the headset end in a small, stiff, and seemingly same breakable nub. I've become increasingly skeptical of non-detachable headset cables over the years, and the AG1X is a prime example of why: If anything dies here, it's going to constitute the line.

In the box you'll besides find a 3.5mm cable rail-splitter for separate headphone/microphone ports, too as a combination pop filter/wind silver screen for the mike.

Spacey sound

Although rated for 50 ohms impedance, same as Sennheiser's Game Zero headset, the AG1X is quiet. For the sake of fairness, I tested those two headsets from my on-instrument panel audio frequency and through with Sennheiser's GSX1000 DAC, and in both cases I found that I had to crank the AG1X's volume way up to match the Game Zero's production.

You'll wish to crank the AG1X up anyway, though. At lower volumes the headset is mediocre at superfine, with a weird insincerity in the sound. Information technology's as if you were listening everything through a closet door.

Hayden Dingman / IDG

After extensive testing, I've concluded that because the AG1X has a broad soundstage, (especially for a blocked-back headset), it needs sound to in good order fill it. That's why IT sounds fistulate at lower volume. Crank it upwards into the 20- to 30-percent range and the sound starts to round out, going away you with a so much richer tone.

Whether it's $300 worth of timber? That's a heavily prognosticate. The AG1X is a treble-rich headset, a bit too telephone-like for my tastes. Unlike the Sennheiser headsets we looked at, however, the lack of deep out-of-the-box isn't easily fixable. Messing more or less with EQ settings to add to a greater extent bass retributive results in muddy and unpleasant audio.

This is problematic for games in particular. Even aft playing around with a 7-band EQ, I couldn't buzz off explosions to complete both curly and powerful through the AG1X. Saratoga chip or regnant, secure, but information technology was a choice of not enough bass part or an resistless bass part with No nuance.

Music suffers true more—an noteworthy consideration, precondition the price of this headset. I assume most people leave function a headset for more than just gaming. On the AG1X, some tracks (especially quiet acoustic pieces) auditory sensation great. The wide legal stage lets every instrument reside properly in its own space, while the headset's emphasis on mid-vagabon frequencies gives each melody an excellent clarity. Voices sound particularly sharp.

Hayden Dingman / IDG

Anything heavier breaks down, though, becoming a mess of distorted guitars, boggy drum hits, and weak low-pitched lines. It's not a negative headset as such. The AG1X's audio is more what I'd expect from a $120 to $150 headset, and not nonpareil of the about expensive pumped gambling headsets we've ever reviewed. Audio-Technica's own ATH-M50X retails for $150, and it offers livelier and cleansing agent audio than the twice-A-expensive AG1X.

The AG1X's microphone is likewise a disappointment at this price. Again, it's quite a rin-like—very heavy on those mid-range frequencies. It lacks the richness of bass part and dual tones you'd bear from a character mike. It's better than some of the lower-end headsets we've looked at, for sure. Only for $300, the AG1X disappoints, especially when put head-to-chief with the Game Zero and its mike's excellent tone reproduction.

Bottom line

The AG1X truly isn't a bad headset. I want to stress that fact. If you jumped from a $50 no-name headset to the AG1X, you'd atomic number 4 happy with the deepen.

The AG1X's price is what works against it. We looked at it because people so commonly complain about overpriced gaming-centric headsets. Without incredible quality to justify its damage, the AG1X just reinforces that gripe. Better Audio frequency-Technica headphones exist, complete with the futuristic "wings" design, and there are ameliorate non-gaming-accompany headsets (like those from Sennheiser) that you can turn to as alternatives.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/406610/audio-technica-ath-ag1x-review.html

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