Astro A40 2013 Ed.

TehMiik · March 20, 2015

My review of the Astro A40 Headset and MixAmp

I know I start off my reviews usually with 'so...' and 'okay...' and this time I'm taking a different approach. Before I purchased my Astro A40s in 2013 I had been using several dreadful Turtle Beach headphones on the console and a Microsoft Lifechat LX3000 which was a bit of a classic icon when it came to PC headsets. The latter had been pretty good with surprisingly pleasant bass, decent mids and very well represented highs. Turtle Beach may have changed since then but when I was using them they were not so good. The quality was dreadful, they were awfully uncomfortable, they had a non modular system and so when the cables broke the whole thing broke and overall it wasn't a very good experience.

Then I splashed out and bought £200 worth of gaming headset. I new these would be good because of the ridiculous amount of press they had and still do have with sponsoring a butt ton of gaming teams. I bought the 2013 Editions in white with a MixAmp which is basically a cheap pre-amp as I wanted to use these with almost everything I have on my setup including my Xbox 360, my PC and my laptop/phone. These things were mega expensive but to be honest I think that was money well spent. They have kept in amazing forma and wear has been minimal considering they have moved house with me twice and have come along with me on adventures in my county.

This brings me on to my first supporting point then which is that they are extremely versatile and can be used with everything due to the modular design of the whole system with detachable cables going from the headset to the amp and then inputs and outputs. With the balance for chat and game volume on the MixAmp they are really good at using in Skype or whatever whilst you play. The next point then is the reliability and ruggedness of the whole headset. Like I said they have moved house with me twice and I have used them everyday since I got them. When I go to family's houses then I will take them to listen to music or watch a film or something which makes the whole experience really cool because although I don't want to lose £200 worth of headset, you don't have to guard them with your life. Also, because there's a modular system you can just take the headset and a 3.5mm cable and not bother with the MixAmp at all if you're on a bus journey or out and about.

They are hugely endorsed by a load of gaming teams and many other companies and I can see why when it comes to the actual audio quality. There's an equaliser on the MixAmp to suit gaming, movie watching, music listening or just a flat sound and even without that equaliser there is an immense sense of direction in games such as Battlefield and Call of Duty. It sounds weird to say that you can hear where the people are on the map but you actually can. These cans have saved my bacon many times and even won me games in some situations.

So overall then I would recommend these headphones and the MixAmp 100%. If you have the money that is. If not then save for them because they are absolutely awesome and they will last a long time. In my opinion you can't get a more well rounded headset. The one thing I will complain about though is the microphone quality. It just sucks, it's really beaded if you're expecting to record gameplay commentaries with this then you'd be upset with it.

9/10