SteelSeries Arctis 7 - Lossless Wireless Gaming Headset review

SteelSeries Arctis 7 - Lossless Wireless Gaming Headset review

SteelSeries Arctis 7 - Lossless Wireless Gaming Headset review

FORGreat sound
Comfortable fit
Reasonable price
Seamless wireless

AGAINSTFine-tuning music takes some work
Roundabout phone and speaker functionality.

SteelSeries Arctis 7 2019 Edition Specs

Driver Type 40mm neodymium
Impedance 32 Ohms
Frequency Response 20Hz-20KHz
Design Style Closed back
Microphone Type Bidirectional electret condenser
Connectivity USB (wireless receiver)
Weight 0.8 pounds (375g)
Cord length 8.2 feet (2.5m)
Battery Life Up to 24 hours
Lighting None
Software SteelSeries Engine

no no we are you annoyed by the cable on your gaming headset sometimes the cable is positioned on either side the here cup which makes placement of your PC annoying in your space many headsets also exhibit cable noise as when it's brushing against your shirt you can clearly hear that in your ear cups which is annoying of course cable management is a thing on how you can actually route it in your space and some headphones even have the dual wire coming out of each ear cup which is not that pleasant when you're trying to take them off and it just becomes you know you have to deal with the wire any way you slice it unless you've got a

wireless pair that gives you that convenience or freedom of movement not worrying about the cable around your body you still have to position something around your computers for the wireless receiver for the headset but how does the artists 7 play out in this whole Wireless Arena let's check it out right after this hi I'm looking for a case well look no further I got this beauty the H 700 I buy NZXT with all steel premium frame with a side of tempered glass - beautifully showcase any cooling adventure you might pursue and came a management system

that you wish you had earlier all this lit up with integrated RGB lighting and built-in fan control the aged 700 I this one's for you oh I'll take it alright so the arcus 7 from a feature standpoint is one of the best wireless headsets around that this priced inline with competition from Logitech and Razer although the new Void pro from Corsair is cheaper so if the lack of cable is a priority for you that is an option you can check out the full view right here as

expected the entire arc this family is diverse from standard analog pairs to bluetooth to USB RGB headsets and it's a really nice surprise to not see RGB on this wireless pair to preserve battery life the overall structure is fine with plastic ear cups with pleasant rubber coating the top headband is metal unlike the plastic construction on all other arctas pairs the swivel joints are a little bit too loose for my taste but notice there is no creaking so that's awesome the self

adjusting fabric is swappable and stretches a little bit and it's a cool customization element definitely more unique than RGB lighting and the earcup cushions are nice to the touch with a soft Center but I find them not thick enough to compensate for the convex plastic housing of the driver that I can feel with my ears so the arcus 7 is slightly heavier than the non-wireless arctas 5 in Arcis 3 because there is a battery in here and our other wireless components but

unfortunately SteelSeries have not done any structural changes to accommodate for better comfort I find this all-in-one fits all type of headband that stretches based on your head size not ideal because I'd say I have a medium-sized head with a lot of hair so I'm already touching the bottom of that metal headband which has very little padding this will be an issue for people with larger heads because we do have width adjustment which is fine but not much height

adjustment and therefore even though the clamping force is nicely balanced for example I can feel the top of the headband but the headset is being sort of supported by the ear cups on each side and because we cannot extend the headband leaving the headset around your neck is uncomfortably tight it's just better to take them off when not in use the microphone is retractable that has less than usual flexibility so it stays in one position every time you pull it

out it is always on unless muted with a switch at the back that you can easily find and the red LED is easy to notice when it's muted don't believe all the marketing hype that you see especially with SteelSeries claiming this is the best microphone in gaming so it's clear and it's detailed it's got some nasally elements to it in terms of Brac on compression right now I'm typing on an MX blue keyboard which is right below me and you can still pick up those

keystrokes although they are muted but in terms of comparing this microphone to other mics it's clear and it's not as nasally as the Void Pro Wireless and what you're hearing now is the coarser void Pro Wireless so this one is a bit quieter it's not as detailed it doesn't have as much of a lower end bass pickup and I think this one sounds a bit more nasally and what you'll listen to now is the Sun Heiser game one my far my favorite gaming headset microphone it's rich it's

detailed and you guys can compare to what it sounds like you know wired versus Wireless in this price range there are many controls on the headset starting with the power button then a dial for chat mix that lets you balance your voice comms or in-game volume with a tactile middle bump the battery indicator is the blinking color of the power button or the 4-bar battery icon in the software and I think just a simple percentage of the battery number would

have been better on the other side is the mic mute a smooth volume dial from zero to a hundred a USB mini-b eight pin cable and a 3.5 millimeter input for audio sharing and the micro USB for charging so this micro USB port is only for charging and firmware updates it does not work without the wireless receiver but you can plug in the USB mini-b Aitken cable that ends with a 4-pole 3.5 millimeter jack so the headset can be used with mobile devices or a controller without

the need to power it on now the wireless receiver is a bit different than usual it's a compact hub with the white LED at the front if solid the connection is fine and if blinking the headset is either sleeping or disconnected there's a pair button on the side and on the back there's the line in and out which is pretty cool because you can route your speaker's into the hub and have it automatically switch between the headset if it's on or the speaker's if the headset is off and put

the line in you can connect whatever source that has a 3.5 millimeter output into the hub that will then wirelessly transmit audio into your headsets for for example if you want to play audio from your smart phone from the hub or like Nintendo switch that does not support USB audio but you can route that analog signal into the hub that will then go here or maybe from TV so that you get that Wireless convenience without having to actually connect the headset directly

into your source now I was actually quite surprised with a plug-and-play setup process I already have the Engine 3 installed on my computer and that recognizes the headset immediately but both the firmware and additional drivers have to be downloaded which is automatic for it to work properly now I normally never touch anything in the settings but I do like to hear the mic side tone so I put that on high and some EQ adjustments are always nice

for a competitive game play the dynamic range compression is unnecessary and just sounds horrible if you want to hear everything on a uniform decibel level just use the volume wheel to adjust your volume and as far as the surround sound experience with DTS X as usual it's quite bad it expands the soundstage but you lose directional cues that they're otherwise audible and stare and many important audio elements are now muffled so the only advantage with

surround sound on is a slightly larger immersion of you audio environment as with stereo things are a bit closer to you and closed off in this headset but the stereo mode is actually quite nice with lots of detail on the high end I prefer a brighter sound signature for competitive gameplay because you pick up all the trouble and all the little things that make you aware of your surroundings and where things are coming from the mid-range is great and the bass is weak which I actually prefer for a competitor gameplay and the wireless signal is actually quite

impressive not only in the range Department I got about six meters with a few walls in between without losing signal but in terms of clarity and not hearing any distortions or any background hiss or noise and stuff like that it's completely fine very good signal in the wireless department so it's actually quite nice if you like to listen to music podcast or whatever else while being mobile around your house that's for battery life it's nothing about standing still series claims 24

hours of listening time I got about 20 hours of continuous use before the red blinking LED start to go off and the convenience of microUSB for charging is good because many mobile devices utilize micro USB so charging this thing should not be an issue I still wish that we have the percentage of battery left in a software so that you could be a little bit more clear on how much is left and the headset does shut off by itself to preserve battery life when not in use but unfortunately I found that I have to power it on manually every morning after the computer

has been shut down and I wish that it would automatically get that connection through the hub when it's on and power on the headset as well so that I don't have to manually do it every single morning and so the arctas 7 is fully loaded from a feature standpoint as far as wireless headsets go this is not the best mic in gaming but it's pretty fantastic with awesome stereo drivers but I wish the headband structure was taller for extra comfort I wish the dials in the back were not

as loose because anytime I put the headset on off I constantly switched something either the volume or the chat mix and I wish that the connection between the headset and the hub was a bit more automatic and pick up the signal right away when the the hub is on so I don't have to do it manually all the time now the main thing here is that Wireless convenience which is incredible but this thing will not be replacing my game one just yet but if you are building this whole wireless set of gaming peripherals then perhaps consider the Ark the 7k .

SteelSeries Arctis 7 - Lossless Wireless Gaming Headset review

Lossless 2.4 gigahertz wireless audio the best microphone in gaming and 24 hour battery life and these are just some of the claims that SteelSeries makes about their ArcGIS 7 wireless gaming headset can this thing really live up to all that hype we're gonna find out right now the ArcGIS 7 is not a new headset but SteelSeries has made some improvements in the 2019 version some of those improvements include thicker padding on the ear cups for enhanced comfort a redesigned reshaped headband and a tweaked overall soundscape for better audio quality the

outer shell of the ear cups is made from a hard plastic while the inside is fitted with this nice soft thick foam padding and steel series chose to use this nice fabric padding that in my opinion is an awesome design decision because this stuff is a lot more comfortable than that plasticky fake leather type of stuff that you see on so many other gaming headsets this stuff here just feels nice and soft against your skin and doesn't feel like it's overheating or gonna get all sweaty and

gross after long periods of time on your head the headband consists of a metal arch combined with a soft elastic adjustable fabric strap and although that's a little bit different than a traditional headset strap it does feel quite comfortable on your head even during long gaming sessions I would say I have like a medium to large-sized head and the artist 7 feels both comfortable and snug at the same time there's no RGB lighting or gamer styling of any kind it's just a simple and sleek design that won't have people staring at you if you were to wear it out in

public or at the office or something like that although I guess that depends on where you work so I'll let you be the judge of that the bottom of the headset is where you'll find all of the manual controls there's the power button chat mix dial microphone mute switch volume dial 3.5 millimeter jack and a micro USB charging port the controls are easy to reach and are laid out intuitively my only complaint is that I sometimes hit this volume controller what I'm taking

the headset on and off now that doesn't sound like a huge deal but I accidentally crank up the volume sometimes put the headset on and scare the crap out of so the built-in microphone is also hidden down here where it's tucked away inside of the ear cup so when you need it you simply pull it out and you're good to go and I think it's pretty cool to be able to store it away inside the ear cup when it's not needed SteelSeries likes to brag about the quality of this

microphone well this is what it sounds like personally I don't think it's anything groundbreaking or amazing but in the context of gaming headsets overall it is pretty good now the sound of your own voice being recorded by a gaming headset is always going to be super subjective as to whether or not you like it but I think in general most users of gaming headsets will probably be satisfied with the quality of this microphone set up is a breeze all you do is plug the USB hub into your computer press the sync button on the receiver and then press the sync

button on the headset itself which is actually just the power button and that's it you're good to go once you're connected you're free to enjoy wireless lag free audio with a range up to 40 feet now I put these things on and I walked around my entire house listening to music and I never had any problems whatsoever with the quality of the audio or dropped connections or anything like that it's pretty awesome equally awesome is the battery life SteelSeries claims up to 24

hours per charge and while I didn't attempt any 24-hour marathon gaming sessions to find out cumulatively I think I got about 20 hours of use out of these before needing a charge so that's pretty good so what about sound quality well it's actually pretty good it's a gaming headset and that's really where it shines its bass-heavy much like other gaming headsets although I would say to a lesser extent then what I would consider typical I think it strikes a pretty good balance

where it provides that big bass e sound in games that makes explosions and gunfire just sound epic but at the same time it's not so overpowering that you can't hear other important audio like footsteps or voice cues and this kind of balanced soundstage actually makes them pretty good when just listening to music as well and these do support DTS headphone v2 which simulates a 7.1 channel surround sound system personally I don't use it I don't actually like simulated surround sound audio when I'm using a headset I just preferred the best quality

stereo audio that I can get configuration is handled through steel series engine software which you can download for free from their website and I will provide a link in the description the engine software is a refreshingly simple application that won't leave you feeling frustrated trying to find what you're looking for the software allows you to toggle the DTS headphone surround sound on or off if you choose to turn it on then you can tweak the settings a little bit with optional profiles and bass and dialogue enhancement there's an adjustable equalizer that

you can tune to your taste or select from a list of presets and a dynamic range compressor that will moderate volume fluctuations and deliver audio at a uniform level on the right side there are some microphone controls this one will allow you to hear a live preview to assist with microphone configuration mic side tone will allow you to hear your voice through the headset and you can set how loud your voice will be using this slider and of course there's a slider for

adjusting the sensitivity of the microphone as well and finally there's an option to configure how the headset behaves when it becomes inactive the SteelSeries Artes 7 can be purchased from amazon and that price does fluctuate a little bit but overall this is a pretty good headset for gamers that offers good sound quality and outstanding

wireless connectivity if you're looking to cut the cord definitely check out the steel series arc de 7 purchasing links are going to be right down here in the description of this review.

I've done a few reviews of different wireless headsets but I've only just got around to doing gaming wireless headsets I recently did the HyperX cloud flight and I realize that actually the sort of the big competitor at a very low price range was the SteelSeries artists 7 now my mat is still series I koala the stuff generally so I thought I'd give it a go you know they see here it's some of the kind of the sort of benefits to it lossless Wireless its discord integrated it's got game and voice chat separate volumes so let's let's watch we'll take a look at the kind of packaging

and such it was quite harshly to slide it out eventually we got there then you've got to slide it out again sideways and finally you find the actual headset now it's quite a simple affair at this points we've got the actual headphones obviously and then when we look back at other box we've got these sort of cables I do like still soon as they tend to sort of just make sure you've got all the cables you might want this is the actual receiver but it's got like a line in and a line out

which again I also quite like because you plugged in USB the line is handy they used their own proprietary sound cable and then a micro USB for charging I do like the extendable boom arm a very handy because it's not always when you gave me that you need to be chatting it's not able to slide out of the way when you don't want it seems fairly well made I like the band that goes over the top is that a little bit fiddly to adjust you can't have to take it off restate the velcro put it back on see how it feels so it's not as easiest you traditional kind of just extendable arms but

at the same time the the band over the top of your head gives that extra bit of support so normally it's just the air cups holding onto the side of your head that keeps them in place and I quite like that the band does this gives you support so here's the the volume mixer between game and well in my case discord which it was quite interesting quite handy there power button on the other side the Mark USB charging points we serve over here the mute button that pops

out when it's muted as well as the red lights on the edge of my phone the master volume and then the to sound inputs as I think I said already they do feel well made their fills Questor D that don't sort of wobble about you wouldn't want them to the padding is generally nice and soft although it's worth knowing that the speaker on the inside is a firm something worth pointing out and strangely as I do it now it seems fine but there are times when I've got the

headset and I moved my head and I hear kind of almost like a squeak and if you've got two sponges that are slightly shiny surface and rub them and they make a weird noise as they rub together it can be a bit like that I happen to have the SteelSeries Engine 3 software already installed because as I mentioned I have a still to his Mouse it's able to the RT seven we can see I've not got much battery left him in the last 25% but we're gonna go on in it's a relatively

simple affair here we've got the surround sound turned on we've got a say sound profile set to game we can say how big the room is we want for the stereo profile we've got bass enhancement with a graphic equaliser with a dynamic range compression which basically tries to smooth out the volume level effectively a bit further over live mic preview what you're doing near this point Mike's eye tone basically works like a pass through from the microphone in your headset so if

you need to speak to somebody we need to hear what's going on outside of you it passes it through Marc volume and then power off options blinking Emily when the hats off that's on the controller unit that connector units that plugs into the PC so fairly simple software but at least the Ritz erm you do have some control over things and you can if you wish if I can actually close it well normally you can see the battery there we go the battery level performers wise that start with the sound quality I think that sound really good they've got a good bit of bass thick

the voices sound good the overall sound quality is I would say very good I don't think I can tell the difference between stereo and 7.1 surround sound I which could be part of the big selling point for these headset and I don't think it makes a big difference to me maybe you can I'm not sure I'd love to your comments do you know do let me know in the comments down below battery life hard for me to quantify precisely they claim to have 24 hours they certainly seem to have lasted me quite I don't think I've really charged them over the week that I've been using

them as well as the software the four bars in the software you do have the power button flash is kind of green amber or red depending how much juice you have left if we move on to the mic though whilst I love the boom arm the natural quality is really quite bad let's give you a sort of a demo now this is a sample of the microphone on the other seven and quite frankly I think it's terrible it's the only one only gaming headset at any time ever I've been in a game and people haven't been out to understand what I'm saying hopefully you can now but it just seems very

quiet very much what I've looked through all my settings everything seems to be okay I don't have issues with her game head so that's really quite a worry so we'll know I realize the headset because they're nice and comfortable I love the stretchy band design over the top even though they're slightly heavier than some headsets that's 350 grams you don't feel that because the the band over the top supports the cups on your head the cups themselves are nice and big and large plenty of space my big ol is so comfort levels were really good at the sound is good maybe

even great so kind of no issues there every size very good it has got 7.1 surround sound if you can tell the difference I love the retractable boom on quite often I'm playing I don't need to be using voice so you can just tuck that other way but the microphone is it's just such a concern that strangely as I turned it around I've definitely had with our way around cuz it doesn't fit into the headset either way but I said turn around people said I sounded a bit better so I'm even wonder if I've got a faulty headset again I'd love to hear your comments down below if you

have any experience with it this is the 2019 Moldovan have a variety of a models and I have heard samples of previous models and it seemed okay so yeah that for me is a bit of a deal-breaker with a Mobius about like so a lot of people just couldn't really understand what I was saying in voice chat which is not really acceptable from a modern day gaming headset so let me know your thoughts in the comments down below my name's Andy I'll catch you all again soon
of them .