Review – Have you ever wanted to experience exceptional sound quality in the comfort of headphones while looking like you’re at a rave or gamers expo? If so, the latest product Haymaker sent me to review might be right up your alley. Haymaker gaming headsets are the pinnacle of “e-sports products”. The carbon fiber patterned appearance and RGB lighting effects can be seen by everyone except you. Beneath this fancy exterior hides some pretty decent headphones, especially when wired via a USB connection or a high-quality DAC (digital-to-analog converter).
what is it?
Haymaker Gaming Headsets are headsets for the high-end gamer market. These look like they were designed with gaming streamers in mind, and have bright LED lights printed throughout the exterior. They feature large, high-quality drivers that offer great audio, noise cancellation, Bluetooth/USB/analog connectivity, and a price tag that matches a ton of features.
What’s in the box?
- Haymaker Gaming Headset
- Spare cloth handset set
- 3.5mm
Hardware Specifications
- Driver: 40mm dynamic
- Frequency Response: 20-20KHz
- Sensitivity: 119±3dB
- Impedance: 32Ω
- Battery life: Bluetooth up to 43 hours, no lights, 60% volume / 12 hours, ANC and RGB lights on
- Charging time: 1.5 hours
- Weight: 322 g (11.5 oz)
- Charging connection: USB-C
- Bluetooth Type: 5.0, A2DP, AVRCP, HFP, HSP
- Supported codecs: APTX, APTXHD, APTXLL, AAC, SBC
- USB Game Audio: DIRAC 7.1 Surround, DIRAC HD Audio, Stereo 2.0
Design and Features
My first impression of Haymaker gaming headsets is that they feel more like toys than pro/audio headsets. This is probably due to the all-plastic/carbon fiber look, which makes them fairly lightweight. That’s a good thing for long-term listening, it just feels like a cheaper product on my first impression.
The logo area on each ear is touch-sensitive, and you can adjust lighting, volume, call answering/hangup, track skipping, and more with various tap combinations.
The first thing you open is the “travel case” that comes with it. I put it in quotes because it’s too big for it to be a reasonable travel option. I think Haymaker knows this because they include a carabiner specifically to secure this case to the outside of a travel bag, knowing that it can fill almost any normal travel bag. To me, it’s an odd choice, especially when these headphones fold into a more compact size (about half the size of this case).
The interior of the travel case provides ample storage for extra ear cups and USB/analog cables. Combined with more extra space, I can’t make sense of it.
Speaking of the extra ear cups, the photo above shows these, they are breathable soft cloth, I prefer them over the default leather (faux leather?) version, which makes my ears hot and sweaty. I like that they include magnetic connections, making it easy to swap them out.
The image above shows the 3.5mm auxiliary audio cable and USB charging cable.
A USB-A DAC (Digital Audio Converter) is also included. This is required for high fidelity DIRAC HD audio and DIRAC 7.1 surround sound when used with a computer. This gave me the best audio experience and is now my new daily driver for work calls and gaming in this wired mode. Alternatively, you can use your own headphone amplifier/DAC for the best audio experience.
The Haymaker Gaming Headset is a pretty standard over-ear headset with an analog audio port on the bottom of the left earcup and a USB charging port on the bottom right. Both types of earcups completely covered my ears and were comfortable, although the leather/faux leather earcups were hot as they are most of the time. The headband has a metal frame, and the adjustment is a smooth glide that stays in place nicely once adjusted. They are big enough for my large skull.
installation and setup
Setup is as easy as plugging the Haymaker Gaming Headset into whatever device you’re using (or connecting via Bluetooth, which is quick and easy). To use DIRAC HD/7.1 mode with USB, you need to first install the software from Haymaker’s website. This is a standard software install, and after rebooting, these modes work with a simple button press on the USB cable’s built-in remote.
Performance
The last pair of headphones I reviewed were Sisheng OV21, and the Haymaker gaming headset is close in quality. I had to really pay attention to the little things to notice the difference, and overall it was a very similar experience to my ears. I don’t have that many moments when the noise in the game or in the music makes me feel like I’m hearing something like the ov21 in the room. Overall, every style of music I like (almost anything) sounds great. I really enjoy using them as my all-day headphones at work.
Manual audio testing showed solid performance across the sound spectrum; ample bass all the way to the edge of my hearing, without the drastic dips seen with cheaper headphones.
Gaming with these headphones is great. DIRAC HD audio mode for very crisp and clear gaming sound, and great voice communication with friends (although I prefer my USB desktop mic to the cheaper sounding mic built into the USB dongle/remote ). Without the small software download from Haymaker, you’ll only get standard stereo audio over USB, but even that sounds better than my average. I can tell the difference with HD audio mode enabled, so it might be worth a shot.
I tried DIRAC 7.1 Surround and I was never impressed with Virtual Surround. You get clearer audio in different directions, which might be good for competitive gaming, but the overall sound quality was greatly degraded to my ears. It all sounds like it’s over processed, with parts of the audio spectrum being reduced too much, while others are over-amplified.
Active noise cancellation also disappointed me a bit. It does a good job of reducing ambient noise, especially with leather earcups, but it degrades audio quality considerably. It’s something I haven’t noticed with other noise-cancelling earbuds or headphones in the past, but it’s worth noting — every time I turned on ANC, everything sounded tinier. It also uses a decent amount of battery, so unless you’re on a plane or a noisy train, you’ll probably just want to rely on the passive noise isolation provided by the closed-back earcups.
I like that these headphones have bluetooth (there’s tons of codec support, including low latency options), but bluetooth has a limit on the quality of audio that can be sent, and I can tell the difference between bluetooth and wired. I did spend a few days in bluetooth-only mode and used it with various devices. I love that you can use them for a variety of purposes, such as while commuting, on your computer, on your game console, in bed without disturbing your partner, etc. In bluetooth only mode, the battery life is very good, the lights are off (40+ hours on the spec sheet, I use them for 3 days, listen for 6-10 hours a day before recharging). If you turn on the lighting and ANC, it can quickly drop to 11 hours. Using ANC and/or lighting while wired will also drain the battery, so be aware of that.
what do I like
- Great sound performance over wired/USB
- Bluetooth long battery life
- suitable for long games
- Compatible with almost anything (Xbox/Playstation/Bluetooth/USB/Aux)
what would i change
- “Virtual 7.1” is still a marketing gimmick to me that just makes most things sound worse
- RGB lighting is overkill for me, but it might be pro for some
- The ANC needs to improve to the point where it doesn’t affect the sound quality too much.
final thoughts
Granted, my first impressions of the Haymaker gaming headsets weren’t great, but over my weeks of testing, they’ve gotten more and more of an effect on me. Personally, I keep my lights off (I use them a lot at work networking meetings, and flashing lights aren’t considered professional in corporate America). However, if I spend a lot of time streaming the game, I can see that the lights are a uniquely striking focal point. Excellent audio quality and comfortable all-day wear are the main factors I continue to use them, and they’ve become my daily driver (for now).
price: $329.95
where to buy (this: hay machine and Amazon
resource: Samples for this review are provided by hay machine
