Hardware Bistro

Product: PulseWave
Manufacturer: TekNmotion
Supplied by: TekNmotion
Price: USD59.99/RM205
Launch Date: April 2008

Have you bored with your current lousy or low end headphone? If yes then you should have a look on this review as we are going to introduce you an innovative headphone from TekNmotion; PulseWave. What so special about this headphones? There are plenty features that normal headphones are not able to provide like 7.1 virtual surround sound, vibration capability, pulsating light and etc.

Company Profile
                                


Having spent years in the industry buying and selling accessories TekNmotion have a good idea what customers want and expect in terms of price and quality. With that in mind TekNmotion has gone out and identified product areas where TekNmotion can leverage our years of experience to take new ideas and develop new quality products with attractive informative packaging. Just like you TekNmotion are users too so we also want a quality product at a good value.

To coin a phrase "caviar quality on a hamburger budget". TekNmotion strives to produce quality products that everyone will appreciate and afford. You can easily pay too much but given a choice, why would you? TekNmotion are also committed to customer service.

 

Features

 

·         USB 2.0 connector for 7.1 virtual surround sound

·         3.5mm Stereo Audio Jack Connector

·         Speaker Diameter 40mm

·         Speaker Frequency Range 20Hz – 20,000kHz

·         Speaker Sensitivity 102db

·         Dynamic Master Control w/ shirt clip

·         Sonic Force Feedback vibration effects

·         Blue, Green and Red Pulsating Lights

·         9.5 feet (2.8m) Connector Cables

·         Detachable Noise-Cancelling Microphone

·         Microphone Frequency Response Range 50Hz – 16,000Hz

·         Microphone Sensitivity 58dB

·         Padded Leather Headband and Ear-Cups

·         Adjustable Fit

·         External Battery Pack w/ Velcro strip

·         C-Media 108 USB 7.1 Audio Drivers

·         Windows XP and Vista Compatible

·         Works with iPod®/MP3 Players

Specifications

Speakers	Ø40mm Diameter VDriver Unitut 32 Ohm 15% Impedence 102 3dB Sensitivity 20 Hz - 20 kHz Frequency Response
Ear Cups	Over the ear long wear comfort ear-cups
Software	C-Media USB, Windows XP/Vista
Product Dimensions	18x12x22 inches
Connections   Plug & Play Cable Length	USB 2.0 or 3.5mm Jack for Audio USB or 4 x AAA for Vibration Yes 2.0M (6ft 6in)
Master Control	Dynamic Master Control box with Master-Mode and Sub-Mode switches. Sound volume adjustment control
Microphone     Noise Cancelling Uni-Directional Length	Detachable, Full Duplex Microphone with Mute button. 58dB 2dB Sensitivity 50 Hz - 16 kHz Frequency Response Yes Yes 18cm (7in)
Battery Pack	External Battery Pack to power your lights and vibration away from the computer

Packaging

 

TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones comes with a luxurious and pretty secure packaging. Besides the outer semi transparent box, there is another sealed plastic box to protect the headphones completely. The packaging box comes with mostly black and green color which reminds me another PC gaming brand if you know what I mean.

 

All the unique features of TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones are written down at the back of the boxing. Driver & software CD and user guide are provided where the user guide is very detail and useful for the first time setup and able understand the TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones further without spending much time for guessing, trial and error.



Here are all the complete box content of TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones; PulseWave headphones, dynamic master control box, external battery pack, multi-connect box (attached with the headphones), USD connector, 3.5mm audio & microphone connectors, instruction booklet, and a piece of Velcro strip.


TekNmotion PulseWave



TekNmotion PulseWave Headphones is a PC gaming headphones so most of its features and the design are based on gaming application in order to attract gamer market. TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones are likely same with some of the gaming headphones in the market but there are some very unique features that we would like to highlight here are 7.1 virtual surround sound, vibrate effect, pulsating light. You may wonder how a headphone would able to provide 7.1 surround sound and actually TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones gives user virtual 7.1 surround sound not the real 7.1 surround sound where the surround effect is simulated by the software.

 

TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones have a very comfortable padded headband and earmuff. Both of the headband and earmuff are made by soft material in order to make it comfortable for wearing as headband and earmuff are the direct parts of the headphones that will contact with users. These earmuff sponge is wrapped by a layer of soft material and this material can be spoiled quite easily as the layer is very thin for giving better comfortable. The earmuff is quite big but will still prefer a bigger one as it may not suitable for certain people whose have big ear and for long period of wearing.

 

TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones can be adjusted to suit for different users where some users may need bigger headphones while some not. The outer earmuff has some transparent acrylic to show the pulsating light. Each earmuff will have 12 LED for 3 colors; green, blue and red. The earmuff is flexible but the degree of flexibility is not quite enough.

 

The microphone of the TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones is detachable microphone which is good for those don’t need them so often so it can be removed to keep it clean. The microphone is very flexible as it can be bent into any size to suit different users’ need. Besides that the microphone is a Noise-Cancelling microphone to reduce the noise during conversation with the rest of the gamers during gaming. Mic can be mute quickly by pressing the mic mute button of the dynamic master controller.



Pulsating light is another unique feature of TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones. This feature must be turned on under special sub-modes and the pulsating light dance is lighten up according to the strength of the bass (blue mean light, green mean moderate and red mean heavy). The pulsating light brightness is not very strong but still very good enough to show off especially during lan party or cybercafe. Another great feature is vibration effect where it is called as Sonic Force Feedback which it is base on the bass of the song or game. The effect can be controlled by the dynamic master controller.

 

TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones comes with a dynamic master controller for gamers/users to change the audio setting easily. There are few buttons of the dynamic master controller; master mode selection (USB or standard), special sub-modes (1, 2, 3), volume control, vibrate control, and mic mute. Besides that the USB and Vibration LED will only light up when they are turned on.

Master mode selection is for user to choice either whether they want to use USB connector (USB sound card) or normal audio connector (system sound card). 7.1 virtual surround sounds only works with USB connector. Special sub-modes are to control pulsating light and vibration effect. Mode 1 is to off both of the features, mode 2 is on both features while mode 3 is to turn on vibration effect but turn off pulsating light effect.



This is external battery pack which requires 4 x AAA battery which is designed for IPod or any MP3 player. A Velcro strip is provided as well for user to stick with the IPod/MP3 player for carrying around; maybe a removable clip is better than the Velcro strip. In standard mode, this external battery pack will able to provide vibration effect and pulsating light if user doesn't have any free USB port.

 

TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones has a multi-connect box at the end of the headphones. We will prefer TekNmotion to split out this multi-connect box out from the headphone because it is a bit big and clumsy. USB, audio and microphone connectors are separated which is good else the headphone will be very irritating due to many cables attached with the headphones.


Installation

 

Installation is pretty easy where user just need to connect the TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones to the system and insert the CD which will automatically proceed with the rest of installation. However TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones must be connected to the system in order to proceed with installation.  After complete the installation, a TekNmotion PulseWave 7.1 Driver Icon will appear at system control panel.

Testing & Performance

 

Here is the C-Media software GUI which allow user to adjust the setting for own preferences. An Icon will appear at task bar whenever TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones is connected. The C-Media GUI has no changes at all since pass few years ago as we have one of the popular headphone from famous gaming brand which is also using C-Media chipset. User can play around with the 7.1 speaker with the C-Media software. Besides the speaker placements, there are pre set of sound environment like Jazz, soft rock and etc standard pre set modes.

 

Here are some of the other settings of C-Media software. C-Media software is a pretty simple software to use, user just need to play around 10mins and should be able to understand the overall functions and setting.

 

TekNmotion has included 2 software programs to test the 7.1 virtual surround sound for TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones. These 2 simples software are able to test out the 7.1 surround sound especially the Helicopter where it can show out the 7.1 virtual surround sound of the TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones.

We have tested TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones and compare with other headphones and one of them is 5 virtual channel headphones from another famous gaming supplier. The Sonic Force Feedback is extremely good and outstanding if compare with the competitor as it is able to give the strong bass and vibration effect.

Overall, we are quite impressed of the TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones where it delivers excellent sound quality with acceptable price. The vibration effect is pretty nice but too much of vibration will be a bit irritating so we always set to middle of vibration level during our testing.

Conclusion

Does 7.1 virtual surround sound will able to help gamer to achieve better gaming performance; we believe it is very subjective as different people will have different of sound sensitivity. No doubt that TekNmotion PulseWave PC Gaming Headphones is one of the great gaming headphones in the market with reasonable price with its attractive great features; vibration effect, pulsating light and etc. The only problem we have during testing is the small earmuff which is not so comfortable for long hour wearing. This problem is also varying for different persons. We would recommend this great headphone for you if you are looking for one unless you have better budget for a higher end of gaming headphone.


Pros:
* USB Sound Card
* 7.1 Virtual Surround Sound
* Vibration Effect
* Pulsating Light
* Detachable Microphone
* Reasonable Price

Cons:
* Earmuff is not really big enough
* Bulky External Battery Pack

For the ultimate gaming experience, try discount noise canceling headphones that keep you focused on winning the game!

 

 Thanks to TekNmotion for providing this sample for us to review.

Only registered users may post a comment.

There are currently no user submitted comments.