I'm making my Christmas list and one thing I'd really like this year is new headphones. I'd mainly use the for playing PC games and also want some with a michrophone so I can talk to comrades online.

Is there anything you would suggest as being good? Also, is the quality of sound based of the headphones or the soundcard? There's no sense in spending a lot of money on headphones if my soundcard can't provide quality sound, or vice versa. Or is there?

Here's an important tip: If you go wireless, make sure your headphones support multiple channels. Mine is a RadioShack infared, but it supports surround sound, and sounds real nice.

Uhh, stereo is just fine. Surround sound headphones are gimmicks.

Sennheiser ftw in headphones, though.

How do you get... surround sound headphones?

Exactly.

Sennheiser--google for the best gaming headsets. They have a lot of really good ones. Stick with Stereo.

Never even knew about them till I googled it. This must be how Echoman.

Let me be the first to tell you:

It doesn't work.

Oh, and leeching is bad.

I'm looking at this one...

http://www.xoxide.com/steelpad-usb5h-gaming-headset.html

I has 7.1 Surround. Which... I have never heard of until just now. (googled)

I wonder if that's a bit overboard, though.

I don't doubt it.

Surround headphones are gimmicks unless they are very expensive Dolby Surround headphones with HRTF and all that fun stuff.

What's your price range? The Sennheiser PC150 is a good headset in the $50 range. You could also buy a pair of real stereo headphones and a clip-on mic for the same or similar price and get far superior sound quality.

Headphones and speakers use the exact same technology, dynamic transducers. The quality and design of the transducer is the chief component in what determines how good a system sounds, followed by the source and amplification. Good amplification won't color the sound (that is change the sound), only amplify the signal. So in an idea setup only the source and the speakers will have any real impact on sound. For most situations anyway. But you aren't going to be using any headphones that require amplification (other than what's on your soundcard that is) and you're probably using powered computer speakers, so don't worry about it.

What soundcard are you using? If you're using an Audigy 2 or newer Creative card, that's a pretty good sounding source. If you already have an Audigy 2, don't bother upgrading to an X-Fi. At least not yet, it's hard to tell if any games will take advantage of this bogus "X-RAM" stuff. Seriously, Aureal 3D offered a better surround effect for stereo than the latest EAX. Albeit lacked the environmental effects, but those aren't even very good.

But anyway, really need to know how much you want to spend, and if you care about using a separate clip-on microphone. Sounds to me like you might as well just get something convenient since you don't care about the greatest sound quality, in which case the Sennheiser PC line would be the best choice. The 150 or 160 models. I've heard the 160 is better but I can't offer any real advice on it.

Oh, and stay away from USB headsets. USB bypasses your soundcard. There's a built in DAC (digital-analog converter) in those headsets and a basic amp circuit to drive the headphones. Both the DAC and the amp suck balls unless you're getting one of those high end Audio-Technica models which costs a good 600-700 dollars. You'll get much better sound quality with a decent soundcard.

Also, CM is right, Sennheiser does make good products, but not everything in their line is good. Some of it sucks. Also, there are many other headphone companies which are often considered superior in the high end (usually arguably superior, the same class of product). They are AKG, Sony, Grado, Audio-Technica, Beyerdynamic and a few others. Just FYI. Oh, and Sony's low-end is absolute crap. I wouldn't touch it with a 40 foot pole.

Not gimmicks. I have surround sound compatible, and when i do a rotating sound test (where sound moves sound 360 degrees around your head), it is simply amazing.

Space_bandit's illustration is right. But don't use articles for data, use experience. But then again I have my headpones hooked into my stereo that's hooked up to my PC, so it varies.

Oh, and I'd like to point out the fundamental flaw with 5.1 or 7.1 headphones. First of all, the 0.1 means a subwoofer. There are no subwoofers in headphones. Period. Second, in a 5.1 setup, you have five channels (in addition to the subwoofer). Two fronts, two rears and a center. The rears are generally for effect, the fronts take most of the load and the center is for speech and music (although the fronts and sometimes rears also have some music and speech coming out of them, but usually more quiet). 7.1 adds additional surrounds on the sides, inbetween the front and the rears. So having a center channel or subwoofer with headphones is completely pointless if you think about it, since the full range of headphone drivers renders it useless. There are quadraphonic headphones which have two drivers in each ear, but will be more expensive and still probably not provide a very good effect. I think most of those are old, newer headphone surround technology is a bit different (but I'm not really well versed on it, so take that with a grain of salt).

Bottom line: Surround gaming headphones are gimmicks and generally sound quite awful. Let me give you a practical situation: A few years ago I upgraded from my dad's Sennheiser HD414s, circa 1968, to Zalman 5.1 headphones. The Zalmans sounded like complete crap in comparison. Yeah, 30+ year old headphones blew away this new 5.1 cans. I immediately returned them and bought a pair of Sennheiser HD497s, which costed less and also blew away the Zalmans in every aspect of sound quality.

Price range = 50 to 100$

And how about a clip-on shirt mic? Is that acceptable? Cost would probably be around $15ish at most.

I have Sony MDR-V6 Headphones, and although they're from the late 80's they seem to do the trick.

I would -really- prefer to have the mic in front of me and not clipped to my shirt, though.

I have some Zalman 5.1's. I found them handy for tracking footsteps in CS:S, nothing like true 5.1 speakers but it was just distinctive enough to help.

That said, however, for pretty much everything else they eat it. The sound quality is ****house. Don't even think about using them for music. In hindsight I would have gotten some Sennheisers.

MDR-V6s or MDR-V600s? The MDR-V6s are damn good, any gaming headset would be a downgrade for you in terms of quality and stereo positioning. I would just get a clip-on mic. There's also a mic attachment for the V6/7506, which is quite expensive, and might need a preamp, but is worth looking into. You'd have like, the best gaming headset though.

They're definately MDR-V6.

Check out those mics that sit on stands. They are the same price as clip ons, but own them for convenience.