Xbox 360 Wireless Headset Review

The Xbox 360 wireless headset came out yesterday, despite being delayed several days, much like the Live Vision Camera before it. It comes in a rather large box (roughly the same size as the camera) and similar to all the other packaging Microsoft as made for their accessories. This is the first official headset that Plantronics has NOT made for Microsoft (someone correct me if I’m wrong) as the official wired headset still is.

The headset is built relatively solid and feels a lot like many of Motorola’s bluetooth offerings. In fact, if you wear a bluetooth headset, you’ll feel right at home here. The design is fairly simplistic and like a bluetooth headset, it features a minimal amount of buttons. You’ll find a ‘power’, ‘find’, ‘volume up’ and ‘volume down’ button on the piece, nothing more, nothing less. It has a padded earpiece and a rubber loop that goes behind the ear. It’s very light, about the same weight as your standard bluetooth headset and it features an adjustable boom mic. I know I keep saying “bluetooth”, but this headset apparently runs on an RF signal, just like the controllers.

The headset is very easy to set up and can be used right out of the box. It comes fully charged (the battery is supposed to last for 8-hours total) and connecting it to the Xbox is a snap. Simply turn on your 360, press the “find” button on the front of the console, then the “find” button on the inside of the microphone, lights will blink and a light on the headset will go solid along with “ring of light” on the front of the console and you will be instantly connected. The four lights on the inside of the headset indicate how much battery life is left (which can also be seen in the 360’s guide blade, next to the controller’s battery indicator) and what player the headset is assigned to.

So, why would you want the headset? Well, it’s much more comfortable than the traditional headset, it offers better sound quality and it’s much smaller than the pack-in headset. The downsides are the hefty $60 (USD) price tag and the fact that it’s not really necessary if you’re happy with your pack-in headset, which comes free with the premium console (which most people have) and again free with the camera. The price is a bit high, considering that the camera was $40, it offered an extra headset, an extra month of Live Gold and two arcade games for free to download, Totemball and Uno. With the headset, you get just the headset, and extra ear-piece (in case you break or lose the one it comes attached to) and its AC adapter.

Pros:

• Very, very comfortable.
• Easy set-up.
• Decent amount of battery life.
• Nice design, can be worn on either ear.
• Highly improved sound quality
• Four headsets can be connected at once.

Cons:

• Hefty price tag.
• No pack-ins like the camera had.
• Unnecessary accessory for some.

Overall, I highly recommend this to anyone looking for a better alternative to the standard headset. It’s WAY more comfortable and offers more freedom of movement than the standard headset and the sound quality has to be heard to be believed. Despite the controller being wireless, the wire to the headset undeniably got in the way, you feel so much more freedom with this headset and playing is more comfortable.