Audio Technica ATH-AG1 & ATH-ADG1 Gaming Headsets - CES 2014
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
1,091 words · ~5 min read
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Linus Tech tips coverage of CES 2014 is brought to you by nc.com your source for
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great technology selection and service along with Corsair memory and Western
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Digital we're here at the Audio Technica booth having a bit of a Holy balls
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moment because they have finally figured out that Gamers around the world are
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using their audio file grade headphones for gaming and they kind of I was being
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walked through the logical process here and they're like well I guess it makes
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sense cuz if you want to hear a bunch of details and Clarity in the music you
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probably need that in games as well and that is absolutely correct that is
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exactly why people are using audio file grade headphones for gaming now with
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that said it's not always the most convenient way to do it so they're like
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okay all right fine we're going to take this we're going to embrace it we're
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going to run with it we're going to make actual gaming headsets so this is the at
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adg1 and the atth ag1 they're both quite
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similar so they both feature their double air dampening system which
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reduces the effect of external vibration on the sound that you're hearing they
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both use their Advanced engineering and Manufacturing processes that are
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borrowed from the audio file grade headphones and then they're basically
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just going okay well we can make that stuff so let's let's put that in here
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let's put you know 53mm drivers let's make sure the impedance is appropriate
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at about 38 ohms so you can run this off of your onboard sound and then let's go
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ahead and take microphones which we also happen to be quite good at and let's
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tack them on so let's start with actually we'll start with the Clos back
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design so the Ada or the at ag1 has a
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sort of matte black and gold aesthetic that should be quite appealing to Gamers
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but not offputting for people who are a little bit more more serious they've
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also got their 3D Wing support system so that is rather than having a full
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headband I'm going to go ahead and model these for you guys there we go oh oh the mic's on
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listen mode so anyway so rather than having a full headband it is meant to be
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no adjustments required it just sits on your head and it should kind of float
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there it's not my personal preference but lots of people do like them which
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leads us to the microphone the microphone is on a 100° swivel so you
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can see it goes a little up and down like that and then this I love these
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flexible sort of repositionable things because the problem with many gaming
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headsets is that they have these large boom mics that end up sitting right in
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front of your mouth when actually the correct positioning for a mouth is more
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like or for a mouth for a microphone is more like at the corner of your mouth so
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this is awesome and it sounds absolutely fantastic they've got a demo here where
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you can talk to each other so and I were both plugged in and standing there
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listening to each other through the headphones and it is uh it is one of the
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be I actually for me it's the best microphone I've heard on a gaming
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headset and I guess it bloody well better be if it's going to cost $250 or
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$300 but then again with that said I've heard gaming headphones that cost that
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much and don't have fantastic microphones so you can take nothing for
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granted these days let's move on to the at80 G1 so this is the slightly more
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expensive one it uses an open back design just as a reminder the difference
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between a closed back design and an open back design is basically how much people
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can hear of what you're listening to and how much you can hear of what the people
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around you are saying or doing so you've got an aluminum mesh that's the that's
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the openness rather than that plastic cover and other than that it's quite
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similar instead of the pleather ear cups we've got cloth ear cups on this model
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the same microphone technology and there's actually something that I missed
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very uh briefly there before and there is a mute button on the inside of the
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mic right about there now they both are
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able to plug into your PC natively using a 3 and 1/2 mm Jack but they also
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include a nice little handy dandy USB Dack the one odd thing about this
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product is that they're using a four-pole connector on the 3 and a half
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millimet Jack I understand why they're doing it they want to be able to
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natively plug into a tablet or a smartphone for mobile gaming in fact
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many Ultra books are using them these days but I think some people are going
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to be a little bit confused when they go to plug this directly into their sound card C or their uh objective 2 headphone
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amplifier or other higher end audio Solution on their PC and kind of go oh
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well why did they do this don't worry though guys there are splitter cabl
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cables where you can take one four pole and go out to two three Poes so they're
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they're available fairly inexpensively thank you guys very much for checking
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out our coverage of the atth adg1 and the atth a G1 audio Technic gaming
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headsets I'm extremely excited about these I wish I could comment more on the
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sound quality but they just have a single demo here running and I'm in the
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middle of a crowded show floor so hopefully we'll be able to bring you guys a review of this sometime in the in
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this year guys don't miss any of our CES 2014 coverage remember our trip to the
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Service as well as Corsair memory and Western Digital without those guys we
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