SteelSeries has been busy introducing a few different products including a full rework of their H series of headsets, the new Siberia Elite, and even a new mouse. To start off our coverage I wanted to check out the new H series headsets, but with the size of my head I was limited to the new 9H that is larger than the 7H that we took a look at it years ago. With a new look, new drivers, and a new size I couldn’t wait to put my Siberia v2’s aside and try them out.
Product Name: SteelSeries 9H
Review Sample Provided by: SteelSeries
Written by: Wes
Pictures by: Wes
|
Specifications |
|
|
Headphones |
Frequency response: 10 – 28000 Hz Impedance: 32 Ohm SPL@ 1kHz, 1 Vrms: 110 dB Cable length: 1.2 + 2 = 3.2m Jacks: 2 x 3.5mm for PC + 4-pole 3.5mm Mac®, Mobile and Tablets |
|
Microphone |
Frequency response: 50 – 16000 Hz Pick up pattern: Uni-directional Sensitivity: -37 +/- 3 dB Impedance: 2K Ohm |
Packaging
The 9H came in a package that can only be described as signature SteelSeries styling. The top of the box is covered in bright orange along with the 9H logo on the front as well. The orange on the black catches your eye while the rest of the packaging is simple. You have a picture of the headset on the front and on the rear. All of information about the 9H is actually on the back broken down by its five key features. They also have a photo of part of the interface in the new SteelSeries Engine 3 as well.
Inside, beyond the headset itself, you get a small 9H guide and a SteelSeries sticker as well. For accessories you get all of your cable varieties. That includes the standard cable that plugs into the headset, an extension cable, a phone adapter, and a PC (mic and headphone plug) adapter. SteelSeries also includes the new USB sound card that the headset can plug into. This means you aren’t locked to any one option with the 9H. This is great for someone like me who might need to use USB on one PC for convenience but on other PC’s I want to hook directly up to a high quality audio card. Bundling in the mobile adapter is also great, most everyone has a cell phone or tablet that requires this if you want to use the headsets built in microphone as well.
Software
With their new headsets, SteelSeries has also started moving their products over to their latest SteelSeries Engine (3). Having used the second version for the past few years, 3 feels a little less cluttered, almost to a fault. When you first open it up it will ask you to select the product that you are using from a list of all supported SteelSeries products plugged in. When you select the 9H it will open up a second window with all of your configuration options in it. I would personally prefer if this all stayed in one window rather than opening up multiple windows on my desktop.
Being a headset the settings that you can change are fairly limited but still more than I would have expected. You have a full equalizer as well as presets available for you to pick from. There are a couple on/off switches for features built into the USB soundcard like the Dolby setting, mic noise reduction, and mic compression. I love how the mic volume knob and mic sidetone knobs look but I did find them a little harder to use than a side slider. Beyond all of that you also have a nice photo of the headset itself right there as well. If you are happy with your settings you can actually save them on the configs tab down at the bottom giving you a chance to save more than one configuration if needed. I suspect this part of the software will become more useful when they start moving their mice over, but it’s still nice to have.
The one part of the software that had me a little confused at the time was the Auto Mic Compression. SteelSeries placed small question marks on each option, clicking on them tells you more about the setting to help get you all setup. In the case of this option, it helps keep your mic volume at a good level if you talk quiet or loudly.
Features, Audio Quality, and Comfort
Before getting into the 9H’s performance let’s take a look around the headset at its features starting with its USB sound card. To keep things flexible SteelSeries went with a cord design that allows you to switch between a USB sound card, mobile phone connection, and a standard two plug mic and headphone connection. The cable itself is sleeved in an orange and black sleeving. It plugs into the 9H itself with a small USB like connection and plugs into the adapter cables or USB sound card with a similar plug. To give you even more options the sound card also includes standard microphone and headphone plugs, allowing you to use it with another headset if you would like.
For the headband, the design still follows what I have seen in the past with SteelSeries’s H line of headsets. The only difference is the 9H does not break down into multiple pieces like past models. The top band is made of plastic and has the SteelSeries logo embossed in the top. On the underside, for your comfort you have almost an inch thick of padding in four “clumps”. Each side has almost two inches of adjustment for people with large heads and if you look close you can also see that each earcup has a slight amount of pivot in them to keep the earcups planted on your head properly.
The 9H has the same pull out design for a microphone that I have seen on all of their other models. The only noticeable change here is in the mic tip that is formed in a way that when it is pushed back into your headset it fits flush. Each earcup has three vents in them, still far from the open air design of the Siberia v2’s but maybe enough to hear if anything important happens behind you when you have them on. The faux leather ear padding isn’t going to help outside noise get in as well. Speaking of the earcups, I love the orange threading uses on them. It matches the orange inside the earcups as well.
So now that we know a little more about the 9H let’s talk a little about its comfort. First I want to point out that as a big guy I do sometimes run into headsets that don’t fit me well. With that said I was happy that the 9H fit me well, much better than the smaller 7H. My preference for headsets is a large earcup design that fits around my ears and doesn’t push on my ears; the 9H does a great job of doing this. The thick padding on the top also does a good job, I normally prefer a suspension design for comfort like the Siberia, but the 9H was just as comfortable. Part of that is because the 9H is extremely light, something that for comfort is a good feature but when I showed off the headset to others they pointed out that the headset felt a little cheap due to that same lightness. Overall I was extremely happy with the 9H for comfort, especially for people with larger heads. I even had room to spare for expansion on the side adjustments!
Audio performance for the 9H’s required a little more testing than normal because they come with the USB sound card as well as the ability to hook directly up to your own sound card. I started by testing through USB first to get a feel for everything. This is where I was able to take advantage of the new software that I wrote about in the software section. I found the audio performance to be good, but a little lacking, especially when I played songs that had more bass. Hooking up directly to my PC I was able to push the headset a little more and get a little more volume, with that they handled the bass a little better and seemed to have better audio quality. I found the overall performance to be good, but not stellar. I think most people will be more than happy with them, but if you are an audiophile I don’t think you are going to enjoy them.
Beyond the comfort and audio performance, there was one issue that I did run into while testing the 9H. The removable cord did give me a few fits where it would come slightly unplugged and I would lose audio or in one case my microphone was quieter than normal but audio was fine. Readjusting the connection fixed that issue. I also felt the pull out microphone was actually a little short, fully pulled out it would reach about ¾ of an inch away from my mouth, basically on my cheek. I haven’t had this issue with any other SteelSeries headset before, when I compared it to the Siberia v2 the length was the same but the Siberia mic hole is closer to the front where the mic hole on the 9H is actually behind the middle of the earcup.
Overall and FV
When SteelSeries first introduced the 9H I was extremely excited that they would finally be making a headset that would hopefully fit me properly. I loved our 7H but its size didn’t fit me well causing comfort issues, no matter how good a headset sounds or performs you aren’t going to keep using it if it hurts you. Because of that my first concern with the 9H was to make sure it would fit me properly. Happily I can confirm that it fit me great and was actually extremely comfortable. The black and orange design is both eye catching as well as clean looking, so in the end it came down to audio performance. I was really hoping the audio performance would be a little better than it was, but it wasn’t bad enough to be concerned as well. My main issues with the 9H ended up being small details like the microphone boom being too short and a few issues with the cable connection going into the headset. I was also a little concerned with I saw the 159.99 MSRP, the 9H is a good headset but I feel they may have priced themselves out of their market slightly. Especially when their competition is selling for much less, hell you can get a wireless headset for less in most cases. Hopefully SteelSeries is able to lower the price in time to make the 9H more competitive; I can see a few people sporting them at their next LanOC event for example.
