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Everglide s-500 Headphone Review
Lincoln 'PrOpHeT' Grixti writes "The Everglide s-500 Headphone is the ultimate tool for gamers that pass long hours using their headset for their gaming needs. It has been designed for gamers, by gamers, with the aid of leading world-wide professionals such as Sander "Voo" Kaasjager and other CPL World Tour Winners. The headset is available for sale with a price tag of $99.99 from Everglide Store. Some might say it's quite expensive for a headset, but when compared to other professional gaming headsets, the price is quite cheap." update Sorry folks, apparently the linked website barfed.
Hey, that's a nice ad. How much would it cost to have Cmdr Taco post my ad on Slashdot?
I still think the Jawbone PC edition http://www.aliph.com/main/pc_edition.htm is far superior to it.
The Everglide doesn't even come with the highend military grade noise reduction stuff the Jawbone sports.
Not even in the same class.
"fantastic contrast between its black and silver colours give the Everglide s-500 a futuristic look that makes it the first one of a genre"
Damn! They were actually able to achieve a contrast between black and silver colours? That's pretty much what I look for in headphones -- high contrast -- and clearly this set is really on the cutting edge.
It might sound like a big name to uninformed buyers, but this kid plays painkiller. He didn't get popular until 2005, and has been a pretty much one trick poney.
I'd be more impressed if it was someone like Brian "Destrukt" Flanders, or even the overhyped fatal1ty would know more than vo0.
I don't care how well you do in one game, if you can't adapt to other games then your opinion as a "pro gamer" doesn't extend beyond your field. Someone whos able to rock at multiple games obviously knows a lot more about being good than just a few tricks to one game, and thus I'd give a shit more about their input on headphones/hardware.
Pain lasts, kid. Its how you know you're alive. Sometimes I think this growing up thing is just pain management-TheMaxx
If you want a decent headset, get a Sennheiser... For the same price you will get much much better sound quality. Even TFA mentions this particular headset isn't great for music.
What makes this a "gaming" headset? The bundled microphone? The carrying bag? The price? The fact that it comes in a box?
gcc: no input sig
"when going to LAN-Parties and other similar events where you cannot lack not having the Everglide s-500 Headphones"
HAHAHAHA
The mark of a mature person is not creating arbitrary criteria for considering others mature.
I only buy products endorsed by Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel.
"Designed for gamers, by gamers" That's completely unimpressive, especially when it comes to audio equipment. What the hell do "gamers" bring to the table- Requests for bigger 'splosions? Special detectors for when Mommy calls dinner's ready?
Give me a break!
Seriously, where's the Foot?
This qualifies for "Laugh, its funny."
It's like one went out to write the worst possible advertisement/review of a crappy product, then submitted it to Slashdot just to have people sit and critize it.
This seriously has gotta be a joke.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
You don't get a huge selection of RTS games on a console simply because it's so cumbersome to play them without a mouse and keyboard. You don't get Warcraft 3, Dragonshard, or Empire at War. You don't get 15 different flavors of Command & Conquer. Maybe, with the newer consoles that support USB, we'll start seeing RTS console games that use a mouse and keyboard. Until then, the PC has a genre of game almost entirely to itself.
And then, there are FPS games. I used to play Goldeneye and Perfect Dark for hours on N64. They were great. I couldn't imagine how they could be better. Then I played Quake, on my schools crummy computers, with a mouse and a keyboard. It was amazing! I could look around, I could see everything! I could even jump! Goldeneye would have been twice as good if it had had that keyboard and mouse combo. Again, with the newer consoles, mouse and keyboard might become pretty standard. But until it does, can you guess where I'm playing my (rts/fps) games?
All ads posted on Slashdot must be pornographic.
Yeah, because, you know... no one ever uses a headset on an xbox or playstation.
I see. I knew there was something wrong when my $20 headphones would actually store up the sound for like 10 milliseconds before playing any of it. Thank goodness this company built speaker drivers "faster than most conventional speaker drivers found in traditional headphones, making the Everglide s-500 optimized for millisecond feedback."
Now I can listen to games without my speaker drivers storing up all the sound before spitting it out.
And it's a good thing they optimized these for games because games produce sound, like, way cooler than music can. And it's directional, whereas music just comes in stereo and binaural forms, which aren't directional at all. And they can pinpoint sound to a pixel, which is cool because I have a lot of pixels.
And it's good they made these comfortable, because people who listen to music only spend like a few hours listening, whereas a gamer like myself will typically game for 48+ hours, so I need that extra level of comfort.
And it's cool they reproduce the full 20 Hz - 20 kHz sounds range; just looking at sub-$500, I have yet to find a pair of regular "music" headphones that can do 20 Hz. (Of course they spec their cans at +/-1dB or +/-3dB; maybe these people spec to +/-60dB, in which they might be right.)
Fortunately, if anyone buys these, he or she must be so enamored with the purchase that he/she will think that he/she has the best set of headphones (for gaming) in the world. And ignorant happiness will ensue. So buyer and seller will have achieved their goals.
Sennheiser makes some great headphones, but I'd take a USA-made Grado set over Sennheiser any day.
http://www.gradolabs.com
Even the basic SR-80 phones (around $80.00) are excellent. And you're supporting a nice family-owned & run business, with a 50 year history.
There's a Starman, waiting in the sky / He'd like to come and meet us, but he hasn't got the time.
Sorry, the link to them disapeared after preview. Here is their web site: http://www.medusa-usa.com/medusa-51-original-singl e-user-p-782.html
It is a good idea to store this packaging so to be able to transport the headset in it when going to LAN-Parties and other similar events where you cannot lack not having the Everglide s-500 Headphones.
/snarky, I know
I cannot begin to not misunderstand the failure of grasping the un-concept of this sentence.
-- Language is a virus from outer space.
What does this mean? Accurate to the pixel? These are just headphones, not a 20-speaker surround system. This whole review is written this way.
"In fact, making the speaker driver very sensible to minimal audio response resulted in this Headphone to lack in Bass audio quality."
Not only did the author use "sensible" instead of "sensitive", they also make an erroneous connection between the speaker sensitivity and bass response. In fact, it appears that the author doesn't understand speaker sensitivity. The speakers are supposed to be super-lightweight, so they make sounds faster than regular speakers, so no one can sneak up on you in a game. The result of this is apparently the lack of Bass (why the caps?). Both of those statements make absolutely no sense.
This review is nothing but a VERY poorly written ad. If you're going to post ads on Salshdot, Taco, at least read the damn things first.
I have a Headphone I bought exclusively for gaming. Sony CD470. It's closed, stable, has a long cord and the best sound quality I've ever had on a headphone. This line of headphones has something like a subscription to audio rewards and gets top rankings every season.
There is but one thing I'd do better for gaming: Anti-Sweat. Closed is good but when your ears get warm after hours of UT 2003 you want some air on your ears.
My perfect gaming headphone would have the sound quality of the Sony CD line, the cord of the Sony CD470, would be as sturdy as the Beyerdynamic Monitor Headphone line (high end studio headphones, start at aprox. 300$) and some sort of nifty air circulation system to keep the ears from going sweaty whilst keeping external noise out. And it would have a line of spare parts for things that break on them and go fatigue. Like the cushions and the lining.
All of this doesn't seem to be part of these bizarly priced headphones. Ergo: Crap or maybe some ok closed headphones. But gaming headphones "by gamers for gamers"?
That's Rubbish. Save your money.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Maybe "world's second". I already have a roll of "bio-cellulose membrane" hanging beside the toilet in my bathroom.
They should build some phones that have a feature to reduce the pressure against the ear at the point where eyeglasses pass behind it.
Seriously. At the $100 pricepoint, your choices of headphones are considerable. Topping my list would be Sennhesier HD 280 Pros for large sealed headphones, or Ultimate Ears SuperFi 3s for for earbud style phones. Both sound superb, and you can get even better sound, in my opinion, if you go with open back phones which might be an option.
So I'm looking at these, and I'm not seeing what they give you that something from a real, respected headphone makers doesn't. They aren't special 6-driver surround phones like Zalman offers (which give supprisingly good surround sound for headphones, though abysmal music reporduction).
All their fluff about the fast membrane is just that: fluff. Sony has used biocellulose membranes in their headphones for some time and they aprobably aren't the only ones. Doesn't really matter, it works well, so do other materials. The "millisecond response time" is bullshit. All headphones respond as soon as the voltage starts changing, and because of the short distance to your ear, propagation through the air isn't an issue. The sound is instantanious. The only thing a lighter, better controlled driver will buy you is better highs. Of course that also requires an amp that can keep control over that driver, which generally takes a current output you don't get from PC soundcards.
To me it sounds like the reviewer has just been using the $5 Radioshack special headphones and this is the first higher end headphone he's ever heard. I remember the experience, I used to always have little America West headphones my dad brought back, that was all I got to use. Then, I finally saved up money and bought like a $50 pair of headphones from Radioshack and I was blown away by how good they sounded. I had no basis for comparison so I was amazed at the improvement. Now, having heard a wide variety of good headphones with good amps, I'm very unimpressed.
Looks like these are some reasonable quality, maybe $40 headphones in an expensive $100 box. I'm sure they aren't horrible but really, do yourself a favour and get some real phones. If you like ear buds I just can't say enough good things about Ultimate Ears. The 3s are great, the 5s are stellar, and I can only hope someday I'll be rich enough to try their 10s. You will be much happier with the money spent. They may not have hired gamers to help them design their phones, but they did get musicians, audigolgists, audio engineers, and other people that, you know, might actually know what the fuck they are talking about.
Sorry, don't know of any hi-fi bluetooth IEMs. Partially I think bluetooth is just too new and the high end audio industry lags on technology a bit, but also I'm not sure you could buid a high quality one of a good size. For good sound you'd need a fair bit of electronics to support the DAC and make a good amp, and then of course the battries to support that. I have a feeling that you'd find the until would get far too large to really be marketable.
Best bet is just to get normal, corded high quality IEMs. I recommend the Ultimate Ears lineup. They just sound stellar and are more comfortable than most earbuds, if you asked me. The Superfi 3s are great, though if you've the cash you will not be disappointed by the upgrade the Superfi 5 Pros offer (give the 5EBs a pass though). I understand their custom line are simply the best headphones out there, though I've never tried them myself.
If you do go that way you may want to get an amp for them, they are exceedingly low impedance which stresses the opamps in many soundcards and laeds to degraded sound.