I have a Mayflower ARC MK2 which I am using with my PS4 and will use it with PS5 once I can get my hand on one, MF has confirmed that ARC MK2 is fully compatible with PS5. Also, all I am playing is COD.
For a long time I wasn’t able to just add some proper audio setup which I believe can push me over to a slightly higher level as a player. I should also add that I am using a hearing aid in my left ear.
I am trying to pair the ARC MK2 with a set of headphones which will enable me the pinpoint accuracy when it comes to footsteps, gun reloads etc. But at the same time headphones which won’t make the explosions overbearing.
So far I have tried the AKG 702 but I did not like the sound of it, I don’t know if this makes sense but it sounded muffled. Then I got the HD660s and all be it things came to life using them and I got a bit of that special awareness I was still not happy with how accurate they were and how much the explosions were taking over the sound, plus while using HD660s I have noticed that first few games I would notice audio ques better and then after about an hour all the sounds would kind of mix together and I would really have to pay attention to sounds to hear them footsteps etc.
Next in line are the DT 1990 Pro which should arrive tomorrow but my worry is starting to be that I just may not be able to experience the HI-FI gaming audio as other people do, in games I mean.
My old cheap gaming headset sounds a bit worse then what I have tried so far and I wanted to ask you chaps what am I doing wrong here? Am I missing something important?
I have gone over the topic you linked and seems like a lot of headphones there are out of my budget, for my first set of cans I would like to stay with in £400- £500 range.
That being said, people mentioned the DT990 600 Ohm a lot which is half the price here in the UK of what I paid for the DT1990 pro, and from what people say in that topic the DT1990 Pro may just be the can I need.
My worry though is that they may not work for me as well as they do for other people. I had the same thing with HD660s were for a lot of people the HD660s were the end game when it comes to competitive FPS and, unfortunately, they just did not work for me.
I hope I did but am a bit anxious. I thought I made a stark choice when choosing HD660s and was mildly disappointed, mostly due to the fact that my understanding was that explosions on HD660s should be very subtle and that I should have pinpoint accuracy when it comes to other audio cues.
well I suppose at that point it depends on your own preferences… k702 I wouldn’t say is muffled… but it definitely is bass recessed so maybe you prefer a more full sound or a brighter sound with a bit more on the clarity
DT 1990 is superb for competitive gaming and for its detail retrieval. It’s a very analytical headphone good at picking out flaws in the sound with a very clear sound to it. It just can be a bit much on the treble for some. Personally I prefer it’s bassier more mid centric alternative T1 but both are really good. DT 990s are alright but they are a bit much on the bass and if you like vocals a lot it may not be the best choice. Beyer as a brand is very good for soundstage, imaging, seperation, and treble which makes them very strong contenders for competitive gaming.
This is exactly what I concluded after my research into DT1990. Plus I found a company in the Netherlands who do passive headphone filters, they have one for DT1990 to deal specifically with that treble pick, which could come in hand if I struggle with the treble.
Passive headphone filters below, from the reviews it seems that it does not alter the signature at all, other than removing that troublesome treble of course.
@Lukasz I know there are some here with experience with those but I’ve heard mixed reviews when it comes to them. I’d just recommend like a foam insert like the one beyer uses for the tygr 300r and amiron wireless as it definitely helps. Other ways are of course equalizing the 8k peak back and a pad swap to something like dekoni.
Let us know your thoughts on the 1990 when you sit down with them
Will do boss, I am hoping I wont have to use anything extra so fingers crossed. That being said i don’t know where to go from here if DT1990 doesn’t do it for me
So the new cans have arrived, albeit I had only played 2h or so, I can already tell the difference when compared to HD660s.
I like to sound of them a quite a bit more, they sound fuller too me but nor over saturated, like sounds are no longer flat. Direction from which the gunfire comes is out of this world plus the fact that I was able to play for about two hours and still be able to pick on them sound signal is another key difference between the 1990 and 660s, on 660s very quickly all sounds were mixing together for me.
That being said, the muffled explosions and week footsteps were still there so it got me thinking, maybe COD WW2 sound is just shit. I downlead BO4 and man, let me F**** tell you did I heard the footsteps in BO4 it is the other wat around, the sound of footsteps takes centre stage and explosions are just there slightly and in the background. This is probably because in BO4 you can select you preferred sound mix, I am using ‘high boost’, and in WW2 all you get is volume slider.
Well, my next question is then is this the best I can get in console gaming? I mean using a Mayflower ARC MK2 and 1990? Or is there a better companion for 1990 then ARC MK2?
world war 2? yeah, that one is awful… no good headphone is going to really fix that.
sounds about right yeah.
well a dedicated setup will be nicer depending on the characteristics your looking for… then again the mayflower should do fine with the 1990 if its just gaming primarily. You could definitely pick up an schiit asgard 3 which I personaly think its a fantastic pairing amp for the 1990 pair that to maybe an e30 or modius dac and your pretty golden… otherwise I have seen Lake People recommended as a potential alternative if asgard is not obtainable. Mayflower to my ear was a bit lacking on the spatial recreation so I felt it limits headphones with air or more space to their sound naturally more of an intimate sound so to speak.
Have you played WW2 COD? You also think WW2 sound was just shit?
Thinking about it now, I have only tested the HD660s on COD WW2 and though it was not good enough for what I needed. That being said the 1990 has been a notable improvement over the 660s on WW2 so I think its time to pack the 660s and send it back.
The neat thing about ARC MK2 is that because this device has a anaoluge mic in input as well as optic in you can create a physical chat game audio mix by adding a simple sound card with a volume knob.
I am more then happy to wait until both Asgard 3 and Modious are back in Stock here in UK Schiit shop but I don’t think there is any way I could setup a chat/game audio mix, or is there?
In regards to having a chat/game audio mix on an external device, what sort of cost am I looking at for something decent?
Yeah, I have played some BO4 last night and man what a difference between these two games, WW2 seems like someone had recorded the audio through a towel.
In regards to the ARC vs another staff, I can pretty much recover the cost of it in full, here in the UK there is decent demand for it so I am fairly confident I can recover my spending via eBay.
What I am after it the best possible experience in-game, but also music. I have listened to the music for a bit in 1990 and man are they powerful, a bit pricing at times. I cannot listen to music on them volumes I used with 660s, the volume has to be lower.
Also, one funny thing I noticed when listening to music in 1990 is that some songs seem to give me that pressure sensation, the reason I notice things like that is I have a balance disorder and my ears are very sensitive to pressure changes between the inside and outside of my ear.
Also, I have only used the pads that came installed and still have to try the analytical pads. I wonder if the analytical pads can give me even better results in-game.
I am assuming you are meaning that the treble is rather uncomfortable by this remark? It’s the 7k-8k treble peak that is more than likely causing that fatigue and potential sibilance… easy to deal with by just using a pad foam insert, equalization, or a pad swap to something other than the two pairs of pads it already comes with.
potentially… balanced pads main change is that they simply add more bass and thump… without that it becomes very neutral bright in sound
If I am not mistaken, the way I should set this up is to have two separate feeds running into the mixer right?
First feed, optical out from the PS4 to the dac, then dac feeding the amp and then amp feeding into the mixer?
Second feed, USB soundcard feeding taking the mic input to PS4 and then taking the PS4 chat output into the mixed?
And then finally lowering the sound of the chat at the mixer level and headphones connected to the master output on the mixer?
I am not sure I am getting this right. First the mixer would have to be specifically just a mix and not other sound processing but also, would the power from the AMP be passed via the mixer?
