The Tracks - Music Playback

Cougar Phontum Gaming Headset Review - Time for the tunes

The Tracks

My test suite for the GH70's will remain unchanged from my prior headset reviews. Like the gaming segment of this article, I feel like the three chosen tracks offer a decent range to test the headset with. I should also say that I did not even bother with trying the 7.1 Surround for these tests. I didn't think it worth it for music.

The Sound of Silence - Disturbed

This track happens to be very bass/instrument heavy, with vocalist David Draiman's deep (even operatic) baritone punching through with little effort. The sequence from 2:00 on is when the track begins to build up, so if you want a bit to listen to, listen to that. The distortion issue did return here, as it did for each track in the sequence. With the volume set at a reasonable level, however, I was easily able to pick up each bit of the track that I knew would be there, and I genuinely felt that the headset was not lacking anywhere in the range. As with the gaming, then, a strong initial showing for the GH70's. With regard to EQ, I did need to slightly alter my previously used 'gaming' choice, as I chose to dull the bass just a little too much for this track's main focus to have the impact it should (for the record, not the headset's fault).

Mr. Brightside - The Killers

Massively different from my choice above, Mr. Brightside is bright, rapid, and - again - I felt as though this headset was not really lacking anywhere where it counted. The EQ I used for Disturbed's song worked just fine for this track, as well. This is a short section as I have nothing bad to say here, so moving on...

Really Slow Motion - Suns and Stars

The accompanying song to Battlefield 1's single-player teaser, it's an entirely instrumental number that I chose for two reasons. One, it's an excellent test to see if the sample can pick up every point of this song without compromising on others. Tracks with both heavy vocals and instruments (e.g. the above two) can tend to mask imperfections in audio gear by having a lot going on at once, thereby leading to an average joe or even seasoned reviewer to miss things. I also choose it because it gets quite unbelievably loud. I knew the unit would have issues here, but with regard to point no. 1, the GH70's put in a great showing. I have listened to this piece of music on several different devices, up to and including some very high-end headgear, and whilst not able to match something like a pair of Bose QC35's or Sennheiser PXC 550's, it's also about £220 cheaper, so I don't expect it to. Like the HS60's before it, for this track, I actually reverted back to the default 'flat' EQ for this one. The preset was more than able to give presence to all elements of the song without flattening or dulling anything that I would call vital.

I think I have covered all that I need to cover in the audio section. Next, we will do a quick run through of the software suite one has to use with the GH70's, and then onto our conclusion.