Gaming Helmet Test H3 - Clarity, power and comfort, the winning combo

"A Star is Born" Jonyboy, June 5, 2021 @ 14:00 - 0 Reaction (s)

Successor of the Sennheiser-Epos GSP 300 tested last year, the H3 EPOS, Wired and mid-range gaming helmet of the brand, arrives.If he loses his Sennheiser claw, confirming in passing the merger of the brand's communication branch and EPOS thus responsible for gaming products, the H3 EPOSE helmet is intended to keep all the know-how of the German manufacturer and displays a level of service servicerising.And it will not take any less to compete with an extremely well received predecessor in his time.

Good for the eyes

To do this, EPOS gives itself the means of its ambitions and the helmet is upmarket...And in price!Let's say it from the outset, displayed at € 119, it's € 20 more than the GSP 300 released last year.This may seem high for a gaming helmet let us remember wired, but it will not take long to understand where these additional ecus requested in exchange.The packaging first, all black dressed in our version, wants to be sober and elegant.Its opening directly reveals the product in its simplest device, the cables and the instructions in a small cardboard box by its side, all coined in a foam setting giving some premium pace to this unboxing.EPOS has treated this part of the experience and contact with this H3 is particularly satisfactory.

The EPOS H3 wanting to be fully multiplanted, two cables are provided.One meter each (which is not 2 meters in length of cable, as available in the specifications, CAUTION EPOS!), Two connectors are offered: one in mini-jack all indicated for consoles and laptops, the other in double coax (speakers / microphone) for fixed PCs.However, we regret the connectors on the helmet side;In owner format similar to a "micro-jack", this immediately prevents any replacement with a standard cable and requires in case of damage the passage by the manufacturer's blind, fortunately provided in replacement parts.It will probably not be useful to get there, because these cables carefully over-tightened and flexible at the same time suggest a beautiful longevity.

After this fine analysis of our expert Jean-Raoul Duble, let's go back to our star of the day, the "micro-cask of gaming with closed acoustic" himself as likes to designate it in his catalog in his catalog.In line with the packaging, the presentation of the EPOS H3 seduces.In the black version "Onyx Black" we have but also available in white "Ghost Snow", the association of materials seems exemplary and very qualitative.Du Plastic Noir Satin à Glossy of headphones and microphone with pavement-cook padded with the hoop and pads, passing by the velvet part of the latter by which the contours of our ears only require being caressed, theEverything seems particularly well studied and invites you to grasp it.

Une grande molette « à plat » particulièrement accessible

In hand, we thus discover generous curves for a featherweight of 270 g (excluding cable), an original line made of a hinge with assumed and clawed design of the brand deporting the articulation of the headphones towards the back of the planeThe Arceau.Its "pole" microphone, fixed on the left atrium, is long, non -interchangeable but robust.It is perfectly positioned without play in the articulation and puts itself into mute by raising it through a very satisfactory jackitis.Wired helmet requires, the product is purified of any push button or LED and is only equipped with a volume adjustment wheel on its right earphones.Very wide and located "flat" in the continuity of the earboard, inviting to a precise adjustment to the two fingers, this potentiometer cover marks the difference with the usual games and testifies if there is oneA more audio heritage than gaming.In the same way, the arceau setting reveals a stainless steel reinforcement of the best effect because, the height of luxury, graduated!This detail very well allows as on more audiophile products to easily balance the helmet and note its ideal position.Subtle promises in short that we just have to test!

Good for the ears

Armature graduée et velours, des prestations de qualité

Before any technical study and specification peeling, before even connecting the console or the PC, the helmet invites so much to the test that we connect it without further delay to our mobile to test its stereo capacities.Collection of albums in lossless on the other end of the line, and this is the first surprise.It is clean, very clean even, much cleaner than a number of gaming helmets tested to date.The sound seems immediately detailed and particularly clear, without any "deaf" effect that the prevalence of the bass of other products confers.What to wonder about what the helmet is able to deliver on this point.Time to launch a little Billie Eilish and we have our answer.The helmet descends low, very low even.Without any distortion and with a surprising power reserve, the H3 EPOS knows how to reveal its color with each piece, with a special mention for its treatment of mediums.The flesh of our forearms to testify, the voices of Norah Jones, Mark Knopfler and others are perfectly restored;At least enough to make you forget the space of a moment that we have on the ears a helmet at € 120 "only".It is by crossing his reflection in the mirror that we realize that we will be complicated to take the metro with the EPOS H3.The micro pole erected like an antenna immediately refers us to the primary use of the helmet: gaming.

We finally resolve to connect the helmet to our controller and light the console, an Xbox Series X in this case.Time to settle, we adjust the helmet and note remarkable comfort.The pressure is perfectly homogeneous from the ears to the above the skull.We then achieve all the advantage of the hinges of headphones deported back as described sometimes.This allows not only the hoop to rest on a less sensitive area of the head, more at the front, but also to articulate the atria on a slightly oblique axis to ultimately better marry the very particular shape of the skull toThe back of the ears.Very good point therefore.Vigilance on the other hand for very large ears because, if we have not been personally embarrassed, the contained size of the earrings associated with large cushions may seem a bit tight.Less worries on the other hand for the budding prince Charles because Epos had the good idea to embed his speakers at an angle, bringing in the headset more depth at the back than at the front to accommodate the pavilionsmost.Really this H3 EPOS checks much higher upmarket products than its price lets suggest.

Trendy console, what could be better than a small gears 5 to get full of the esgourdes.If you have never had a wired helmet connected directly to the pad (i.e.Without going through the small controller interface to adjust the volume), remember to go first in the controller settings.As strange as it may seem, it is here that you will find the sound outlet levels of the controller and the sound / cat balance.By default at 50%, this will prevent you as us a disappointment as to the power of the helmet before realizing that there is a problem.Because power is far from being a problem, far away, that nouni.We will even go so far as to advise you to ensure that the helmet volume wheel is not maximum when you launch a game.Displaying in its 124 db spp 1 kHz specifications under 1V RMS, with a 20 Ω impedance, we did not go to check at the probe, but the sound can indeed be very, very strong.And resume our part of Gears 5 in the middle of a battlefield will have almost earned us two eardrums.It's very cool, but be careful!

In addition to the exhilarating power of the helmet, its audio qualities which.The sound effects are detailed, the voices well in place, all on a sound or musical background that never loses in presence.The helmet is very reactive and shows a very nice dynamic while the quietest scenes are polluted with no breath or require playing with the volume to remain perfectly clear.Everything is very homogeneous and pleasant but...too homogeneous perhaps.What if we paid a Dolby Atmos for Headphones license?Just to see huh...

Xbox Series versus Playstation 5 ? L’élégance en toute circonstance

Wow.That’s the Word.The acoustic quality of the helmet may be intrinsically the same, however, in Dolby Atmos, everything opens up.The games take, so if not a completely different dimension, their full dimension.The spatialization which until then had neither grieved nor breathtaking becomes remarkable, in particular with regard to the placement of objects behind the player.A pleasure, certainly freezing, than to follow the movements of Lady Dimitrescu in his castle in Resident Evil Village, for example.So much so that, strange fact that it will be difficult to explain, it is the scene before that is the most discreet.Far from being disabling because capable of placing objects thanks to the gaze, we would have liked spatialization to be homogeneous at 360 °.We quibble a little because absolutely nothing unacceptable here, but that is to say how much you have to look to find something to complain about this epos h3.

Good for the player!

Lower this "pole" microphone and invite the friends to play to test the communication part.Again, the ability of the speakers to reproduce the mediums noticed earlier has its effect.Voices on all their register are perfectly transcribed.As long as players opposite have good microphones, you have something with this H3 EPOS appreciate all the stamps of their voices.As for the capture, the pole naturally falls into an ideal position that it will no longer be necessary to adjust once in play.The bi -directional microphone that embarks the H3 EPOS may seem simplistic, but with its sensitivity displayed at -47 dB and its oversized frequency response from 10 Hz to 18 kHz, it is above all effective and particularly well suited to the dimensions of the pole.Your voice will thus be perfectly captured in the same way as, by definition, some sounds that can come from your sides.On the other hand, you will not emit any parasitic noise from the controller or the screen, this is the advantage/disadvantage of the bi-directrational.Another flawless one here on the part of this H3 EPOS therefore to whom we cannot blame this bias, if we have no problem with a less discreet pole than on the models ofOther brands and irremovable.

From Halo to Hellblade, via The Medium, Call of Duty or Golf With Your Friends, the test of this H3 EPOS was a pure treat.Yet strong of a (very) "generous" head, your humble tester has never tired of wearing this helmet which swallows the hours of a row without the shadow of pain or even feeling of heatunpleasant that can often suffer closed acoustic models.A sound quality and a comfort that saved us for a few days the 1000 W of our system 7.1 To prefer two headphones, you had to do it, Hat Epos.

Balance sheet

As a multiplatform wired helmet, no H3 EPOS is not Bluetooth, it is also not delivered with a controller interface facilitating sound / cat sound balance, but it has as much autonomy as your controller or deviceof play and, above all, it goes to the essentials, with art and way.What to ask for such a helmet other than sound quality, microphone and comfort?Despite a scene before a bit behind and a Dolby Atmos for Headphones license, if it is not essential, strongly recommended, the H3 EPOS keeps its promises by offering an uncompromising experience where comfort, clarity and power are the watchwords.Epos signs a remarkable product there which gives thanks to the know-how of the German brand Sennheiser from which it comes by bringing the priorities of today's players, to the wallet certainly more garnished.But you are never rich enough to buy cheap, and at 119 € recommended public price, the H3 EPOS is worth each penny.