🔶 Drop + Sennheiser PC38X Gaming Headset

ZTylerDurden · January 28, 2021, 8:48pm

These came in today so I figured I’d report back.

I think I understand now why these are good for gaming. I played some Mario Kart and Smash (realtek drivers). The headphones grab an array of varying sound effects and figures out how to organize and “visually” place them. In other words, I guess these are good at organizing a mess of sounds which are video games .

I’m not an audiophile so ignorance is bliss. These are pleasant to listen to and beats the crap out of my janky old ones.

bishi · February 1, 2021, 5:18pm

I received my PC38X today. They do sound good, but I noticed almost immediately at low frequencies there is a pop/crack/rattle type of noise. Is this clipping? It will only happen at certain volumes or if I have the bass boost on my Ifi zen dac turned on - its pretty horrible. I can replicate it by using 40hz or below on this tool - https://www.szynalski.com/tone-generator/. This is a mic recording of the issue I’m experiencing: https://gofile.io/d/klT9u8 I’m just turning the volume up a bit then dragging the tone slider down past 40hz and up again.

MadGman · February 1, 2021, 6:34pm

Kinda sounds like it.
or just drivers flexing. lol

Pokrog · February 1, 2021, 7:06pm

Burn them in. Seriously. Burn them in. Don’t judge them until you burn them in for like 50 hours.

bishi · February 1, 2021, 8:22pm

Really? You think that might fix this issue? I read that was a myth

Pokrog · February 1, 2021, 9:06pm

Read what I said further up. I literally almost returned them with 10 seconds of use after the first grenade went off in a tarkov game I was trying them in. The driver rattled and sounded like it was going to fall out or there was a broken piece of plastic in it or something. Burned them in for 3 days straight and I think the drivers relaxed enough to not rattle because they sound fine now.

Most drastic burn in I’ve ever experienced.

MazeFrame · February 1, 2021, 9:58pm

Anything mechanical needs some time to get all the bits and pieces moved to resting position.

Electrolytic Capacitors also have a forming period (few hours to a few days).

Conductors and Semi-Conductors don’t need burn in.

bishi · February 1, 2021, 10:11pm

Wow, ok I’ll give it a go then. Thanks guys.

bishi · February 2, 2021, 8:59am

I tried it for 10 hours using these 4 wave files on repeat - https://www.head-fi.org/threads/free-burn-in-files.466827/ and I think it might have actually improved a little! I’ll run it for the next 30 hours and see how that goes.
Can anyone recommend a better file? Seeing as this happens mostly at lower frequencies should I be running something mostly bassy or is it good to have the range.

Thanks.

Joeses01 · February 2, 2021, 9:03am

just throw in some white noise, you will be fine…

Pokrog · February 2, 2021, 3:59pm

There are some YouTube videos for different burn in and honestly they all work pretty well. Pink noise at like 75-80 volume is fine for initial burn in.

bishi · February 2, 2021, 5:37pm

Just out of interest, if you listen to this test MP4 at a reasonably high volume with the PC38X do you get any popping? https://gofile.io/d/GhTxJd

Pokrog · February 2, 2021, 6:15pm

I’ll test when I get home.

Pokrog · February 3, 2021, 7:45am

forgot to update you but i just checked and mine do not rattle at all in that test even at extremely high volume

bishi · February 3, 2021, 8:22am

Thanks for letting me know, maybe these are just faulty then. Burn in for another 15 hours hasnt done much

MadGman · February 3, 2021, 8:30am

but some were so sure it would become better. Why it did not help?
Tested the Atmos sound sample with 6XX for fun and loud, no rattles.

Falenkor · February 3, 2021, 11:36am

that sounds defective… no burn in is going to fix a driver rattling, would recommend contacting the company over that if you can get it resolved. Had these in house myself and had no such issues such as a form of popping or rattling on my drivers

MadGman · February 3, 2021, 1:06pm

He did mention the following: “It will only happen at certain volumes or if I have the bass boost on my Ifi zen dac turned on.”

So there is a possibility, it’s caused by very loud volume and or bass boost that causes clipping on some 128mp3 or youtube clip.
That might have borked the drivers.
If warranty is available, that is a good route to try to replace them.

Still, strange thing that burn-in did not help. Wonder why, i wonder why.

bishi · February 4, 2021, 11:34am

Aye, at least Drop customer service seems decent, they sent the label and everything to print and RMA via UPS drop point.
Clipping was probably a bad word for me to use, its more a loud crack / pop you can hear in the recording I posted. Never had any other headphones act like this so I guess they are just faulty. It’s not really a ‘very loud’ volume, at a normal loudish ‘gaming’ volume really.
Anyway, thanks for the advice all, I’ll get a replacement set and report back.

bishi · February 17, 2021, 1:28pm

Well I just received my second pair… aaaand they do exactly the same thing, rattle/pop at low frequencies at any reasonable volume Guess I won’t be bothering with another pair!