Steggy
01-28-2011, 01:02 AM
Hey guys. Well after about a month of testing, my review for the Astro Gaming A*Star headset is out. Hope you guys enjoy. And to help me out, please check out the video review for it, and leave a comment or a thumbs up, because that really helps me out as far as producing more content for you guys. Once again, hope you enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juGfqavAN9U
The Astro A*Star is the newest headset to join Astro Gaming’s arsenal. The A*Star enters Astro into a market where only a handful of companies have tread so far; IEM headsets for gaming. With the only competition being the Razer Moray+, Sennheiser PC300, and EDGE GX100/400, how does the A*Star stack up? Read on below to find out.
Design:
Priced at 79.95, the Astro A*Star has come out into the race with a competitive price and a bold design that reminiscent of Beats earphones, and it comes with a lot of features. Back when I had reviewed the Moray+ and PC300, I had wished there would be a hybrid between the 2 designs of them. I loved the connectivity options of the Moray+, but the features on the cable itself were nonexistent. You had the inline microphone that was so-so, then the 4-pole jack where the adapters plug into; that was it. With the PC300, you had a chunkier microphone that performed much better, and you also had an inline volume control. However, there was no mic mute switch, and the termination for the PC300 was 2 3.5mm jacks like a normal PC headset. There were some strengths and opportunities for each headset feature wise, and Astro has hints of both headset designs with their A*Star headset.
Right off the bat, I want to mention the A*Star’s right angle jack. This is the first time I’ve seen Astro go for a right angle jack, but with the uses this headset has, I’m glad they went this way. I’ve lost a couple of earphones due to cables shorting out because of the pressure that can be applied to straight on 3.5mm jacks, and that won’t happen in the case of the A*Star.
The Astro A*Star headset is a 4-pole headset like its bigger brothers, the A30 and A40. On the headset, you have a mic mute switch, an inline volume control, a multi-function button, and a windscreen microphone. For connectivity, the native 4-pole jack allows the headset to be used with the Astro Mixamp and smart phones like Droid’s and iPhones, and you can use these as straight headphones with any device with a 3.5mm jack. The A*Star also comes with a PC adapter which allows you to use this headset for PC gaming. I completely loved this idea when Razer had it with their Moray+. I feel like for IEM gaming headsets, this is the way to go. The only other thing I could ask for from the A*Star would be to further its library of adapters. Along with the PC adapter, the Razer Moray+ comes with a PSP and DS adapter, and it would be cool if this option were made available for the A*Star in the future. Technically if you are upgrading from the Moray+, these adapters are usable with the A*Star, but it would be nice if there were some made by Astro and sold separately, especially considering all of the new handhelds that are slated for release, like the 3DS or PSP2. I’m hoping that down the line, Astro will have these types of adapters available a la carte on their website.
As mentioned above, the Astro A*Star includes an inline microphone. This is the 2nd attempt from Astro at an inline microphone in their headsets. If you recall my past review of the A30, I thought its inline microphone could use some improvements, as the positioning didn’t lead to the clearest communication. I did not experience this with the A*Star headset. At natural fall length, the microphone picks up my voice clearly, even when doing PC recordings, where subtle imperfections can be pin pointed in recording. Below you will find a sound clip of me speaking into the A*Star microphone, so you can get a gauge of its quality (While this may only be noticeable if you’re listening to this with headphones, there may be some background hiss/noise, this is due to me recording this through the front audio ports of my desktop, so that’s my front I/O’s fault for not being shielded, not the A*Stars).
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VQX44YF0
Another design aspect of the A*Stars I wanted to mention is its flat cable design. This was my 2nd headset that used flat cables, and like the PC adapter I mentioned above, the second I tried this out, I thought “this is the way to go for IEM gaming headsets.” The flat cable design is used to alleviate users from cord tangling, and it certainly does its job with that. But more than that, the flat cable design provides a sense of strength in the cable without adding too much to bulk or weight. One of the problems I noticed with the Razer Moray+ was that its thin gauged cable made me worry that it would be weak and not survive a decent tug if it should ever occur. The feeling is not had with the A*Star. And for the cable tangling itself, I found the flat cable design to once again be successful. To clarify to those who haven’t used this type of design before; it’s not like there is a protective force field that prevents any tangling from happening at all, but what the design does is prevent tangles from being an actual problem when unfurling. With thin gauged ear phones, tangling can lead to nasty knots which take a while to fix. You won’t get that with the A*Stars. Getting them from their case and fully straightened out never took more than 10 seconds for me.
Speaking of which, the A*Stars do come with a carrying case. How does it stack up between the Sennheiser PC300’s and Razer Moray+’s? I’d put it as a tie between it and the Moray+. The Sennheiser PC300’s case was just sort of a coin purse that you could put the headset into; you couldn’t fit its ear tips or extension cable in it. The Astro A*Star case is a neoprene Velcro enclosure case that can hold the headset itself, as well as its accessories. The A*Star case has an all purpose pouch on the other side of the Velcro enclosure. Astro says an option for this pouch is to stick an mp3 player or smart phone in it (I actually didn’t know this until my buddy akaTrent pointed it out). However, I personally wouldn’t go with this option because it doesn’t fully enclose these devices. Astro says that the devices weren’t supposed to be fully enveloped by the case, because how would you be able to plug your headset in then? It makes sense, but I just personally wouldn’t use it for that myself because I’m paranoid and don’t want anything happening to my 200 dollar touch screen phone (they’re so fragile!). What I did use the all purpose pouch for was to hold the A*Star’s ear tips and PC adapter though. I liked the Moray+ case because it had all of the compartments for the adapters, and it would have been cool if the A*Star case had this too, but seeing as the A*Stars only have the 1 adapter, the compartments wouldn’t be necessary; and you could fit everything that comes with the A*Star in its case thanks to the simple all purpose compartment. With everything being said though, you’d think that the Moray+’s case would be a peg better than tha A*Star, but what’s handy about the A*Star’s case is that it has a clip so you can clip it to your belt loop or backpack. It’s a nice option to have so your pockets aren’t completely full, and the Moray+ case is missing this feature.
Lastly, speaking in terms of comfort, the A*Stars perform as well as any IEM headphone or headset. You get 4 tips (1x small 2x medium 1x large) to ensure you have a good fit; the standard for any IEM. To new IEM users, keep in mind that there is a plugged in feeling when using these types of earphones, but you get used to it. They’re worth it because they can really come in handy for noise cancellation with the seal you get, but there is just a bit of an adjustment period at first.
Now, with all of the features considered, how do the A*Stars fare against the competition in sound?
Sound:
The sound of the A*Stars is where I’m a bit torn. Gaming with the headset reminded me of gaming with the PC300’s. You had a pretty open sound stage for positioning gun fire. However, where the PC300 had rather veiled highs, the highs of the A*Star were pretty bright in gaming, so gun shots sort of had a little bit extra impact. Other than brightness in the highs, you had a nice balanced sound, and the quality seemed on par with the PC300; it definitely outperformed the Razer Moray+ in gaming. The Razer Moray+ was more useful in handheld gaming (hence its handheld adapters), and it was useful if your goal was to game privately without disturbing those around you, but headsets like the A*Star and PC300 are useful if you’re looking for real performance in directional positioning when playing FPS’s.
However, in music, the differences between the A*Star and Sennheiser PC300 became more noticeable. When listening to music on the A*Stars, the clarity was nice, but when I had the music turned up at higher volumes, I noticed distortion in the mids and the highs. I’ve heard some complaints about the bass, but the bass is at a pretty nice balance as long as you’re getting a good seal on your buds (having that seal is huge for these types of earphones). But when the volume was louder, the mids and highs had a tinny, almost shrill signature, and their sound became a bit more muddled together. When I used the PC300’s, they were able to handle higher volumes without losing clarity, though it can be more fatiguing when you have a strong low end to have them at high volumes. But this is where I noticed the biggest differences between the A*Stars and the Sennheiser PC300. The A*Stars still outperform the Razer Moray+, and if you look at prices, the price of the A*Stars fits in between the prices of the Moray+ and PC300, so its sound quality being between the 2 sort of fits.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juGfqavAN9U
The Astro A*Star is the newest headset to join Astro Gaming’s arsenal. The A*Star enters Astro into a market where only a handful of companies have tread so far; IEM headsets for gaming. With the only competition being the Razer Moray+, Sennheiser PC300, and EDGE GX100/400, how does the A*Star stack up? Read on below to find out.
Design:
Priced at 79.95, the Astro A*Star has come out into the race with a competitive price and a bold design that reminiscent of Beats earphones, and it comes with a lot of features. Back when I had reviewed the Moray+ and PC300, I had wished there would be a hybrid between the 2 designs of them. I loved the connectivity options of the Moray+, but the features on the cable itself were nonexistent. You had the inline microphone that was so-so, then the 4-pole jack where the adapters plug into; that was it. With the PC300, you had a chunkier microphone that performed much better, and you also had an inline volume control. However, there was no mic mute switch, and the termination for the PC300 was 2 3.5mm jacks like a normal PC headset. There were some strengths and opportunities for each headset feature wise, and Astro has hints of both headset designs with their A*Star headset.
Right off the bat, I want to mention the A*Star’s right angle jack. This is the first time I’ve seen Astro go for a right angle jack, but with the uses this headset has, I’m glad they went this way. I’ve lost a couple of earphones due to cables shorting out because of the pressure that can be applied to straight on 3.5mm jacks, and that won’t happen in the case of the A*Star.
The Astro A*Star headset is a 4-pole headset like its bigger brothers, the A30 and A40. On the headset, you have a mic mute switch, an inline volume control, a multi-function button, and a windscreen microphone. For connectivity, the native 4-pole jack allows the headset to be used with the Astro Mixamp and smart phones like Droid’s and iPhones, and you can use these as straight headphones with any device with a 3.5mm jack. The A*Star also comes with a PC adapter which allows you to use this headset for PC gaming. I completely loved this idea when Razer had it with their Moray+. I feel like for IEM gaming headsets, this is the way to go. The only other thing I could ask for from the A*Star would be to further its library of adapters. Along with the PC adapter, the Razer Moray+ comes with a PSP and DS adapter, and it would be cool if this option were made available for the A*Star in the future. Technically if you are upgrading from the Moray+, these adapters are usable with the A*Star, but it would be nice if there were some made by Astro and sold separately, especially considering all of the new handhelds that are slated for release, like the 3DS or PSP2. I’m hoping that down the line, Astro will have these types of adapters available a la carte on their website.
As mentioned above, the Astro A*Star includes an inline microphone. This is the 2nd attempt from Astro at an inline microphone in their headsets. If you recall my past review of the A30, I thought its inline microphone could use some improvements, as the positioning didn’t lead to the clearest communication. I did not experience this with the A*Star headset. At natural fall length, the microphone picks up my voice clearly, even when doing PC recordings, where subtle imperfections can be pin pointed in recording. Below you will find a sound clip of me speaking into the A*Star microphone, so you can get a gauge of its quality (While this may only be noticeable if you’re listening to this with headphones, there may be some background hiss/noise, this is due to me recording this through the front audio ports of my desktop, so that’s my front I/O’s fault for not being shielded, not the A*Stars).
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VQX44YF0
Another design aspect of the A*Stars I wanted to mention is its flat cable design. This was my 2nd headset that used flat cables, and like the PC adapter I mentioned above, the second I tried this out, I thought “this is the way to go for IEM gaming headsets.” The flat cable design is used to alleviate users from cord tangling, and it certainly does its job with that. But more than that, the flat cable design provides a sense of strength in the cable without adding too much to bulk or weight. One of the problems I noticed with the Razer Moray+ was that its thin gauged cable made me worry that it would be weak and not survive a decent tug if it should ever occur. The feeling is not had with the A*Star. And for the cable tangling itself, I found the flat cable design to once again be successful. To clarify to those who haven’t used this type of design before; it’s not like there is a protective force field that prevents any tangling from happening at all, but what the design does is prevent tangles from being an actual problem when unfurling. With thin gauged ear phones, tangling can lead to nasty knots which take a while to fix. You won’t get that with the A*Stars. Getting them from their case and fully straightened out never took more than 10 seconds for me.
Speaking of which, the A*Stars do come with a carrying case. How does it stack up between the Sennheiser PC300’s and Razer Moray+’s? I’d put it as a tie between it and the Moray+. The Sennheiser PC300’s case was just sort of a coin purse that you could put the headset into; you couldn’t fit its ear tips or extension cable in it. The Astro A*Star case is a neoprene Velcro enclosure case that can hold the headset itself, as well as its accessories. The A*Star case has an all purpose pouch on the other side of the Velcro enclosure. Astro says an option for this pouch is to stick an mp3 player or smart phone in it (I actually didn’t know this until my buddy akaTrent pointed it out). However, I personally wouldn’t go with this option because it doesn’t fully enclose these devices. Astro says that the devices weren’t supposed to be fully enveloped by the case, because how would you be able to plug your headset in then? It makes sense, but I just personally wouldn’t use it for that myself because I’m paranoid and don’t want anything happening to my 200 dollar touch screen phone (they’re so fragile!). What I did use the all purpose pouch for was to hold the A*Star’s ear tips and PC adapter though. I liked the Moray+ case because it had all of the compartments for the adapters, and it would have been cool if the A*Star case had this too, but seeing as the A*Stars only have the 1 adapter, the compartments wouldn’t be necessary; and you could fit everything that comes with the A*Star in its case thanks to the simple all purpose compartment. With everything being said though, you’d think that the Moray+’s case would be a peg better than tha A*Star, but what’s handy about the A*Star’s case is that it has a clip so you can clip it to your belt loop or backpack. It’s a nice option to have so your pockets aren’t completely full, and the Moray+ case is missing this feature.
Lastly, speaking in terms of comfort, the A*Stars perform as well as any IEM headphone or headset. You get 4 tips (1x small 2x medium 1x large) to ensure you have a good fit; the standard for any IEM. To new IEM users, keep in mind that there is a plugged in feeling when using these types of earphones, but you get used to it. They’re worth it because they can really come in handy for noise cancellation with the seal you get, but there is just a bit of an adjustment period at first.
Now, with all of the features considered, how do the A*Stars fare against the competition in sound?
Sound:
The sound of the A*Stars is where I’m a bit torn. Gaming with the headset reminded me of gaming with the PC300’s. You had a pretty open sound stage for positioning gun fire. However, where the PC300 had rather veiled highs, the highs of the A*Star were pretty bright in gaming, so gun shots sort of had a little bit extra impact. Other than brightness in the highs, you had a nice balanced sound, and the quality seemed on par with the PC300; it definitely outperformed the Razer Moray+ in gaming. The Razer Moray+ was more useful in handheld gaming (hence its handheld adapters), and it was useful if your goal was to game privately without disturbing those around you, but headsets like the A*Star and PC300 are useful if you’re looking for real performance in directional positioning when playing FPS’s.
However, in music, the differences between the A*Star and Sennheiser PC300 became more noticeable. When listening to music on the A*Stars, the clarity was nice, but when I had the music turned up at higher volumes, I noticed distortion in the mids and the highs. I’ve heard some complaints about the bass, but the bass is at a pretty nice balance as long as you’re getting a good seal on your buds (having that seal is huge for these types of earphones). But when the volume was louder, the mids and highs had a tinny, almost shrill signature, and their sound became a bit more muddled together. When I used the PC300’s, they were able to handle higher volumes without losing clarity, though it can be more fatiguing when you have a strong low end to have them at high volumes. But this is where I noticed the biggest differences between the A*Stars and the Sennheiser PC300. The A*Stars still outperform the Razer Moray+, and if you look at prices, the price of the A*Stars fits in between the prices of the Moray+ and PC300, so its sound quality being between the 2 sort of fits.