Unboxing & Review: Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 7.1 Surround Sound Gaming Headset

Armaggeddon is one of many gaming peripherals brands that is renown in the local gaming community, delivering quality products at an affordable price range. We've been reviewing gaming mice and keyboards of Armaggeddon previously and so this time, we're checking on one of Armaggeddon's latest gaming headset, the Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 7.1 Surround Sound Gaming Headset.

Affordable 7.1 surround sound doesn't usually comes around, but Armaggeddon has the Fuze 3C 7.1 set on a ridiculous price of RM169. Sounds just too good to be true? Well, that's what we're about to find out now! 

Packaging

The Fuze 3C 7.1 comes in the usual black & yellow themed box across most Armaggeddon products, with some of its features highlighted at the front of the box. A small cutout window on the box allows user to see the actual product without having to open up the entire packaging.

Specifications of the Fuze 3C 7.1 can be found on the side of the box for reference purpose.

The back of the box contains information in regards to the Fuze 3C 7.1 in various languages, as well as a brief information on Armaggeddon itself, manufacturer's warranty etc. 

The Content

Inside the box you'll find the Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 7.1 gaming headset, a drivers CD and user's guide.

The design is pretty good in overall, except for the cracking effect that is made for illumination purpose. We're not a big fan of the over exaggerated cracking effect design, but hey! Everyone has a different taste right?

The lighting effect - multicolored LED that shines through the cracking effect design.

  

And yes, the LED color does rotates in every few seconds. 

The multi-directional microphone is surprisingly flexible, but from the direction and angle where it is protruded from, you can only have it placed at the left side all of the time.  

The volume control gear is built directly on the left ear cup, looks unclean at first but we find it very to reach compared to the ones that we usually sees hanging on the headphone cable.

Same goes for the microphone mute/ unmute dip switch.

The headband pleather cushion isn't too soft to the touch, but it's still considered to be acceptable at for the price you're paying for.

Large ear cups that fully covers your ears instead of pressing against your ears is a great help when it comes to long hours gaming session. As for the pleather cushion, it's main purpose is to isolate against noise from the outside while contains the sound within the ear cups for better overall experience. Looking good so far!

The use braided cable for extra durability and ferrite core to eliminate potential noise does worth the praise, as it's not a common trait that we normally seen on most affordable gaming peripherals.  

Testing: Putting on the Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 

The very first thing we noticed at the moment we have it on our head is the lack of clamping force. The Fuze 3C just sits loose on our head literally and causing discomfort after hours of gaming, the ear cup isn't covering our ears firmly as we hope it would be. Other than that, the noise isolation is basically a big no - the sound just leaks from the ear cups and you can see imaginary music notes flying everywhere.  

Testing: Software

First look at the speaker volume control menu, there's nothing much special about volume control slider here. The sound preset however, is a big shock to us and here's why: 

• Hi-Fi is the just right present you want 
• Both Movie mode and Music mode is just horrendous as everything turns into a mess from that very moment it is selected
• Manual mode does nothing at all. Wait...what?  

The microphone volume control menu is basically the same slider design for you to adjust, no special mode nor preset for this.

This is pretty much the only thing can you mess around with the application settings... Armaggeddon... Really?

Testing: Gaming, Music, Movies

Much to our surprise, the Fuze 3C 7.1 does have a pretty decent sound stage and pretty balanced treble and bass, not something we would expect from a RM169 headset. 

For gaming, the sound a whole lot better than most headset that cost roughly the same as the Fuze 3C 7.1, especially for gunshots, explosion, footsteps from FPS games. If you're more into music and movies, the Fuze 3C 7.1 did just as good on both. 

Testing: Microphone

We did a quick test on the microphone as well with recorded speech, skype call with different level of voice tones and we're glad to report that the result is all good. Both speech for recorded speech and skype call can be clearly heard regardless of the level of voice tones used.

Verdict

Ignoring the clamping force issue and device limitation due to USB as its one and only connector, the good overall performance at that price is unbeatable - Compared to most gaming headset around the price of RM169, the Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 7.1 is no doubt a steal, REALLY!

For those who is looking for a bang for the buck gaming headset under RM200, the Armaggeddon Fuze 3C 7.1 is definitely a worthy candidate, given if you can cope with the 2 drawbacks mentioned earlier. 

Pros

• Affordable
• Good sound quality
• Good microphone clarity
• Braided cables with ferrite bead to eliminate potential noise
• Comes with built-in USB sound card

Cons

• Limited to PC, laptops or devices with USB port that can detect the USB sound card
• Lack of clamping force results in less immersive experience and discomfort after long hours of usage
• Microphone can be used only on left side