CM Storm Pulse-R Gaming Headset Review

Testing
The testing method we are going to use today is with and without an add on sound card. We are going to cover everything from Gaming to Music and movies. We do understand that the CM Storm Pulse-R headphones are marketed towards gamers but we would like to cover all bases of audio.

Over the course of 2 weeks I have spent the first week without the sound card and the second week with a soundcard. The sound card we used for testing was a Creative X-FI Titanium.

Here below we will have some shots of the CM Storm Pulse-R head set lit up when you have the USB cord plugged into your PC. The first picture is going to be of the microphone. Then we have a shot of the ear cup lit up.

CM Storm Pulse-R Gaming Headset CM Storm Pulse-R Gaming Headset

Now here is a complete shot of the head set with the lights lit up.

CM Storm Pulse-R Gaming Headset

Microphone
When using a microphone for a gaming headset it is vital for you and also your teammates that you have a good mic. While using the microphone on the Pulse-R the quality is decent, however; when using a program like TeamSpeak or any other online games it becomes difficult to understand who is speaking. It is as if you are distorting your own voice when you talk.

Music
One of the first things we did was jump on YouTube and played all different types of music. Also opened up Winamp and played a bunch of MP3’s to test out the music quality. When listening to music with and without a soundcard we noticed that the headphones seemed to be lacking in clarity. Vocals seem to be a little on the weak side and bass seemed to be a bit messy. Parts of sounds sound clear but other parts of sounds sound like they being played from your neighbor’s house. When listening to Pulse-R with a Soundcard it was still about the same quality but a little better.

Movies
While using the Pulse-R to watch a few movies and videos. We encountered some of the same issues that we were getting while listening to music. If actors were talking during a scene it would seem like they were whispering. However when using a soundcard we were able to get better results while watching videos due to better processing over the onboard audio. This made watching movies have better directional sound and better vocals

Gaming
Gaming on the Pulse-R is what it was made for and well it does it quite well. While gaming with the onboard sound you were able to tell it is a better quality over other stereo based head phones in the gaming field around the same price range. Now when you toss the CM Storm Pulse-R on a dedicated sound card you are able to hear a big difference in sound quality while gaming due to the virtual surround sound. However the bass does seem to be a little messy still. I would also like to note that while using the Pulse-R with and without a sound card while in VOIP programs like Skype and TeamSpeak the people talking seemed to be muffled out a little bit and while playing games online this is a vital thing that gamers need. It is also hard for you to determine who is talking sometimes when you are in the middle of a firefight or gaming.