Gamdias Hephaestus PC Gaming Headset Review

Performance

When testing the headset I fired up my volume test track, which you can listen to here. I take three readings, one with the decibel meter directly against the drivers, then two more with the monitor on my desk to record how much sound leaks when operating at 100% volume and again at 50% volume. Since this headset has three bass levels via its vibrational driver switch on the in-line controller, I tested all three separately.

The headset isn’t overly loud at max volume, it’s what I would call “loud enough” without being at a level that is a risk to damaging your ear drums, which is no bad thing. Having the bass level at max did knock 2dBa from the maximum volume, likely as the vibrational drivers draw more power, reducing the overall power getting to the main drivers. From a human ear, you can’t really notice this drop in volume as you’re gaining huge amounts of bass as a by product, but the dBa meter is obviously more sensitive to the change in volume.

Noise leak is very good, the design of the drivers does a great job of keeping the sound in, something that will no doubt please the person sitting next to you while your blasting out your favourite songs, games or movies.

Acoustic performance on this headset is nothing short of stellar, having the vibrational drivers do the heavy lifting on the bass side of things frees up a lot of range for the main drivers, giving them a crystal clear and flat response no matter how hard you decide to push those vibrational units. This makes hearing footsteps in your favourite game nice and clear, vocal tracks in movies sound smooth and natural and music benefits greatly from the impressive overall clarity.

With the vibration units off, it’s a pretty flat EQ sound that is provided, great for in-game voice chat, Skype or just general light music listening. Flick on the first step of the vibration unit and your treated to what sounds like a standalone subwoofer. Impressive, thick and detailed low-end thump that really fattens out the sound in games, movies and music alike, it’s about what you would expect from any good quality headset with a decent amount of dynamic range. Put the drivers up to max vibration and you’ve got some really cinematic, head shaking thump going on. When things get frantic you can actually feel the headset vibrating a bit, it kinda tickles too. Tickle aspect aside, the bass is profound, for bass heavy music, or explosion in games like Battlefield, or fight scenes in movies like Transformers 2, you’ll feel like your head is in a cinema, and it’s freaking awesome.

There are many DPS and audio effects built into the software, that do work pretty well, but I couldn’t find any settings that beat out the default settings. Sure there are virtual surround options and a very powerful EQ, but it’s really a matter of personal preference, or dependant on what content you’re trying to get the most out of.

The microphone is a real stand-out feature too, loud and clear even in a noisy room and the noise cancellation works wonders, a real benefit to those who enjoy LAN gaming events where there is often a lot of back ground noise that can clog up your chat audio. You can also change the pitch of your voice via the software, which is kinda cool in general, but no doubt annoying as hell to your team mates, so use it wisely.