Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsVERY good Wireless Gaming Headset!
Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2020
After my absolutely horrid experience with Razer during an RMA (Razer took SIX MONTHS to RMA the headset...), I was looking at contenders for my business, I ended up going for the SteelSeries Arctis Pro Wireless, after reviews for the Arctis 7's reviews highly suggested the headsets. I was NOT disappointed!
The headset IMHO is probably THE BEST headset you could get with the feature-set it offers!
If you're looking for a gaming-centric headset that checks the most boxes, this is it.
The unboxing experience is nothing but premium, and you can proudly, if you wish, display the box.
Everything is well-packed, and they use solid packing protection.
The headset itself needs very little setup, simply either pair it via Bluetooth, or get the base station wired up, and connect it to your device respectively. DO NOTE, that the Optical In jack is labeled as PS4, as I guess they intend the optical to only be used for the PS4. You CANNOT rename the label, but obviously you can plug in nearly any Opt Output into that input, just know it's labeled PS4. I do wish SteelSeries would just label the inputs as the type of input it is rather than what they envision you using it for; however, this is just an insignificant gripe.
You will find the base station to be rather light, but honestly, it stays in place on the desk rather well, I've never had an issue with it sliding around.
Setting the base station up is as simple as plugging in your inputs, optionally plugging it into power (I believe it can pull power needed from USB, but I find the wall-based power to be the better solution), and then configuring preferences like EQ and things. I do suggest keeping Auto-Off on Off because it will shut off the headset after that time elapses, regardless of what is going on.
Lastly, the base station includes a slot to charge one of the two included batteries for the headset, which last a solid 6ish hours without needing to be charged. (Which charging one of these batteries I swear only takes like 30mins to an hour, and you can swap 'em when one gets low. There is a warning when it reaches like super-low power) You can also charge the headset via MicroUSB directly if you need it.
The headset itself matches the near-zero latency that they advertize with the 2.4g WiFi from the base station (which is probably the way you connect to your devices if you are using the base station anyways.)
The headset itself sounds VERY GOOD, not quite Audiophile, but VERY good all the same, and unless you need that audiophile level of sound, you can't really do better IMHO. It handles everything rather well that I throw at it, even decently in the high-volume range where most headsets start to have some issues.
They are not as noise-canceling as something like the Bose Quietcomfort II's, so if you absolutely need isolated sound, you might not find the SteelSeries Arctis Pro Wireless to fit your needs; although it does block out most sub-ambient noise.
I do have ONE semi-major complaint, and that is the "Game/Chat Balance" feature on my headset seems to drop out the secondary channel. To clarify, when I assign an app/game to that channel, it works fine for a while, but eventually, it fades the channel and cuts the audio entirely, unless I go into that app, and fiddle with the volume to fix it, only for it to fade again. This is likely a driver problem on my end, but also I am running on Linux on my PC, and I haven't yet found a driver that addresses that problem. If SteelSeries sees this, please reach out if you can!
On the other side though, these truly are multi-purpose! I can effortlessly go from gaming on my PC, to watching a movie in bed with these and achieve a pretty cinematic sound (The Game of Thrones intro is BREATHTAKING with this headset!). You can reliably watch at full-volume and no-one is none the wiser, which really transports you away from the rest of the environment and isolates you in whatever you are watching. It's quite something!
In another note, you only get Bluetooth 4.1, instead of the (at the time) new Bluetooth 5, but I hardly notice a major downside without it, although I hope they update the headset soon with things like BT5 and maybe stronger WiFi. To be clear, I can get great range from the headset, and it only cuts out after I get to the other side of my house, which is all I really need.
The microphone stands pretty much toe-to-toe with my Blue Snowball, which is a relief, although for constant use I STRONGLY recommend using the popfilter attachment that they include with it, although you might run into issues when you go about retracting the mic boom into the headset when you are done using it. Also I believe it covers up the mute LED on the mic itself, but you can outright turn off the LED if you need.
They are pretty comfy, and I don't really ever feel uncomfortable wearing them, or after taking them off, yet they are durable, and built to last. You get all the support of a metal skeleton, with none of the discomforts, and I find the "Airweave Fabric" band, which doubles as size adjust, to be suitable for even 10 to 12-hour gaming seshes
Overall, I'd take these everywhere if my job wasn't so... Potentially abusive to the headset, with different oils and powders. I'd recommend them while traveling as well, although I am not particularly sure if the extra batteries are TSA-Compliant, but I think they are fine.
Overall, there is VERY LITTLE this headset does wrong. I am very satisfied I got this headset, and probably will buy again!
Edit:
Over the years, the headset still preforms well.
The issue I eluded to regarding the second chat channel fading, is NOT a driver problem but a hardware one. There is a capacitor on the internals that shuts off the channel if below the threshold, which is rather unfortunate. One other thing worth noting, where each side of the headset attaches to the frame, they are only secured via plastic, and are susceptible to fatigue if care isn't taken, they are pretty durable, but they would've done better by securing the headset modules via metal that isn't likely to break and effectively break the headset.
