Astro A50s, PS5 and the need for an optical cable

Pbst · December 10, 2022

Hey Forum,

I recently purchased the Astro A50s for my PS5. I mainly use them for Call of Duty and my soundbar usually for other games. I purchased the hdmi adapter but up until now have not used it and instead just connected the charging station per usb.. Some websites say that the hdmi adapter is only needed for the astro game/voice chat balancing, when actually you also need it to use the dolby capabilities of the headset. When I played GoW Ragnarok I noticed the audio settings were set to stereo headset 3d audio. When using the hdmi adapter I came across two issues:

1. The adapter is fit with HDMI 2.0 so its capped at 4k 60Hz.

2.The optical cable can only transmit 5.1

I found out that you can also use the optical output of your tv, so I would still have 120hz. I thought I. heard a difference in sound to using the adapter. Astro themselves don't advertise this as an option. Is it at this point better to use the 3d audio option with the simple connection over usb ?I liked the 3d audio sound and am unsure if the directional sound is better using dolby. IGN gives the ASTRO A50s as the best high end ps5 headset. Are there better headphones ? Do games like God of War Ragnarok take better advantage of Sony's 3D Audio ? How much value am I losing by not using dolby ? Finally, and maybe less relevant, why is it more complicated to use surround with the headphones than a soundbar ? Some have said that the issue will be fixed at some point, but it has been two years since the launch of the PS5.