Razer Megalodon Over Ear 7.1 Surround Sound PC Gaming Headset

Short VersionThey are worth they money, they are very comfy to wear, the sound quality and bass are great and the Microphone works properly. People don't take the time read manuals and troubleshoot when they go wrong and assume its the products fault. PC parts do not always jive well with each other without a little fussing. If you wanted simple and easy go buy a console.Long VersionOk I hope people see this review before they read all the posts about how bad these headphones are and how they are not worth the money. Because they are wroth the money.First off to everyone who complains about the microphone quality. You need to realize that this headset has a built in sound card via the USB cord. There are controls and settings on the panel you need to set up. You need to both fiddle with your control panel microphone settings on your PC and the headphone controls on the actually control panel via the cord. There are both microphone output settings and noise cancellation levels for the microphone on the device itself. So when you're trying to set up these headphones you need to make sure you test and tweak theses settings. By default they are up to high and you also must make sure your using a high quality encoding with whatever voice chat system your using. Some built in game voice chat uses really low quality codec's so no matter how good your microphone is its going to sound like crap. This is not the fault of the headset. This is also the case with Ventrilo, the few posts I saw regarding that. If you sound like crap check the sound settings next time. I have done very extensive testing and everyone says I sound better than ever now on my voice servers.Second to those who are reporting actual sound issues. This is mainly due to the fact your usb ports are either not providing enough power to the headset or you just got a bad product. It happens to the best of us. Chin up, contact razor and or Newegg and return for another product. Don't pass judgment on something for a one time flop. Now if your second pair is just as bad of an experience by all means judge away. In the end make sure you contact razor and troubleshoot before returning anything, as I said earlier PC parts don't always mix well without a little love from the user.Third and finally my own issue and a few others here and on the Amazon reviews regarding this product complain that the headset doesn't turn off when you turn your computer off. (The lights stay on basically) This is a motherboard issue and is different for each person. Its really just depends on how your motherboard handles its power settings. For me this was really annoying because my computer sits near my bed, so trying to sleep every night with a bright glowing blue LED headset next to me was rather hard. Contacting razor I explained the issue and after a few e-mails back and forth. (They could be a bit faster on there replies so I won't rate there CS as the best really but they pointed me to the right solution) For anyone having a problem with the power first make sure your USB legacy option is turned on and your BIOS is up to date for anything related to the motherboard. IF this doesn't fix it you need to look under the EuP power mode setting and make sure its enabled, this was under the APM menu in my BIOS. This will allow your computer to turn off certain USB devices when the computer is set to off. I could get more technical but just mentioning the BIOS update might be to much for some people.Last but not least for those who complain about the echo effect? First unless your game or music is 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound enabled and has the proper codec to play it it's not going to EVER sound right. This is why you have a 2.0 setting on the headset. Always to make sure you have the correct sound settings and set the headphones accordingly. Let me assure you if you take the time to make sure your game or your music or movie is outputting the right sound you will never be disappointed with the quality of these headphones.

My experience with the Megalodon is a pleasant one and I would recommend to all who want the upper hand in gaming. I got this beautiful headset after about 5 days using 5-8 day shipping so Im extremely happy with that. Now let me get started on my actual review.- Sound Quality - Upon first listen it just sounded extremely hollow in 7.1 on things that actually were 7.1 but in 2.1 things sounded not as loud as they should have been. Now this may seem to you a giant problem at first but after I had updated the driver from Razer's website and listening to music (Preferably Skrillex =D) for about 3 hours seeing if they needed to be "burned" in a little bit I came to a conclusion that it was either a case of getting used to the headset or if the headset actually needed to be burned in a little bit with some straining stuff on the headset. You can be the judge, because all I know is this headset is amazing. Listening to music is the first thing I did when I got the headset and after that short period of confusion I was listening to music like never before.- Bass - Now for all of you bass lovers like me out there at first you are going to step back and think well...This doesnt really give that giant thump others do...I can explain why after I figured it out myself. I had started up a couple of games like Crysis, CoD4, And Half Life and I soon realized that the reason that the bass doesnt shake the headsets off your head is to preserve sound quality and sense of direction. When a grenade explodes next to you and theres a guy creeping up on you, I think you would prefer hearing him and getting a nice turn-on instead of just having the bass tickle your ears. But as for my final take on it, I LOVE bass...Like love doesnt really express it haha but after getting used to it you can listen to dubstep and even guitars and many other genres like never before while still being satisfied on the bass side of the headset.- Maelstrom Engine - This headset uses a dedicated sound card inside of the control unit that comes with this headset. Upon first touch of it I already feel like Ive had this for a couple of weeks that how easy it was to use. The best parts about the control unit is the amount of preference that is available for your disposal such as how while in 7.1 mode you can actually change the volume of the different speakers so If say you want to know when people are coming behind you more than the front you simply turn down the front and right and left speakers so that the middle and rear speakers stand out more than the front.- The Microphone - The mic is extremely sensitive...Actually too sensitive, but this really isnt a problem if you can get over small problems...All you need to simply do is update the driver software from razers site and your are good to go. But if you really want crisp sounding voice you need to use the control unit by lowering your mic sensitivity and level. Not hard at all, and the whole process only took literally 5 minutes.- Having The Upper Edge - Razer made this headset so that if someones trying to be a wise guy and tea bagging you from behind while everybody is loling all you do is hear his foot step turn around and slap him across the face basically haha. And it does this extremely well might I add...The only and when I say only thing wrong with this headset that I can find so far is that at first you are going to need to do a couple of things before you experience the true beast that this headset really is. I would recommend this to anyone who is looking for a pair of headsets that compare to Senhheiser (Spelling may be wrong 3= haha) Steel Series and even Audio Technica's...***For instruction on how to update your Razer Megalodon check out Razers youtube channel and find their video Razer Megalodon Firmware Update Tutorial at [...] ***