SteelSeries 5Hv3 Gaming Headset Unboxing & Overview
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
1,013 words · ~5 min read
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now to learn more. Welcome to my unboxing and overview of the Steel
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Series 5HV3. So, as you may or may not have figured
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out, the 5HV3 comes after the two and
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before presumably the four because if Steeler is going to keep rolling the way
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that they've been rolling for this last little while with more better audio
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products all the time, we'll probably see a new revision at some point. But in
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the meantime, this is what we've got, folks. So, packaging wise, it's pretty
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straightforward. You take it out and then you have the headset sitting there.
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Undo the little clips at the back.
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That's hot. All twisted up in there. Get
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that undone. Okay. Anyway, u So, what's different about the V3? Number one is
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they have upgraded the drivers. So, the drivers, for those of you who are
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uninitiated, are the speakers inside each of the ear cups. So, it should
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offer better audio quality than the outgoing 5HV2. Now, around the outside of those
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drivers, they've also upgraded the materials for the ear cups themselves.
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So, instead of a cloth covering, they're now using a faux leather covering with
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memory foam inside. So, hopefully you guys can get a pretty good idea of how
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cushy those are. This does a couple of things. So, number one is it will make
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them more comfortable. And number two is it actually improves the passive noise
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isolation. So, there's no active noise cancelling or anything like that, but
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there's less sound leaking in and leaking out of these compared to if they
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were using a cloth covering for the ear
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cups. Now, this is uh obviously optimal for something like a tournament
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environment and the H series is their tournament grade headsets. Another thing
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that's optimal for that if you travel around a lot is having it disassembled.
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So, you can take it apart and chuck it in your bag. I suspect many people won't
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use this feature even if they are traveling with it. But hey, it's there
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so you can use it if you want. The contacts are very robust looking so you
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can actually see how the wiring is done between the two ear cups. So, I wouldn't
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worry about those wearing out over time.
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All right, so let's move around to the left side here. Ah, yes. That right
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there, a Steel Series staple, the infinitely poseable. See that? Look at
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that. I love that. Put it wherever you want. The infinitely pososeable
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retractable microphone. The actual reason I switched from my HD555s for
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gaming to the Steel Series 7H's back when I got those a couple years ago. Um,
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as with any Steeler headset, I would expect the microphone to be good
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quality. Some gaming headsets have microphones, but they're terrible. I
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have never yet had this experience with a Steel Series headset. The headphones
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are of course adjustable, so you can go anywhere from sort of super tall cone
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head guy setting, so right about, you know, there down to something that's
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quite a bit too small for me. So, it kind of sits on the bottoms of my
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earlobes. I wear a mediumsiz motorcycle helmet, so that should give you guys
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some idea what's up. There's a little bit of rotation in the ear cups there,
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but not a ton. I think uh for most people, that's really not going to be an
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issue. But if your ears happen to sit very far back or very far forward, then
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uh it's something to bear in mind. And then you've got about this much rotation
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in them this way. So like vertical swiveing or whatever the case may be.
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The cable's very nice. So they're using a double braided cable this time around.
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And that might seem like it doesn't matter, but if you have cats, it might.
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Or if you, you know, run over your cable with your mouse particularly vigorously.
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No, that actually won't matter. But cats definitely if your cats try to chew
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through this cable, they will have less success than a single braided or a
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non-braided cable. And then that leads to the inline control, which hasn't been
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changed since the last generation product. So it's basically got a
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microphone mute or not mute as well as a
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volume dial. Now, this goes all the way down to ah yes, now we're getting into
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the Steel Series, the other Steel Series classic sort of flexibility thing that
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they got going on. So right here is their swappable cable system. So you can
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actually switch from the two connector,
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so two three poles right there, to this
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guy right here, a single four pole. So you can actually use the 5HV3 with a
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mobile device or ultrabook or anything that only has a single audio jack for
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both headphones and microphones. And then they've also got their included
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extension cables. These are really handy. I don't even necessarily use them
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on my headphones because I I usually have something in the front of my case
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or something sitting on my desk, but these are just really handy if you need
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like, you know, audio extension cables. So, I use them all the time. So, there
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you go. You can either extend them or just use the nice short cable here and
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terminate terminate terminate it in whatever type of ending you desire.
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Thank you for checking out my unboxing and overview of the Steel Series 5HV3.
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