Arctic sound speakers & headphones
Wednesday, 01 September 2010
I haven’t been aware of this brand before – the Swiss-headquartered firm started out making specialist cooling systems for PCs in 1991, so it's little wonder. But Arctic has branched out into audio products.
Not sure if there’s a New Zealand supplier yet, but you can buy online (add p+p).
S111 speakers
These are small, grey and 4 watts, powered by a USB cable (supplied). Another stereo minipin goes into your Mac's (or device's) audio-out.
There’s a large volume control on the back of the right unit (<—).
These are little, fit easily almost anywhere, have enough cable to get them apart either side of a laptop, Mac mini or iMac, but they’re only 4 watts, so not exactly earth-shakers, By the same token, they don’t tax your USB power supply that much either.
Despite the specs, they definitely sounded better than a four-year-old iMac’s speakers, adding a pleasant warmth to the sound, some volume above the iMac’s maximum and a surprising amount of bass, considering the frequency response doesn’t go very low.
What’s great — small and cheap
What’s not — no speaker grilles means that if you pick them up in a hurry or slide/dump things on your desk near them, it would be easy to indent and damage the speakers with your thumbs. Bass response only goes down to 50Hz.
Needs — someone who wants a little more sound for a little cash
Arctic even sells a solar charger for them, for outdoor use, for US$24.60 (about NZ$35), which can also power phones and other devices.
6.5/10
What — S111 USB-powered speakers, US$15.45 (about NZ $22 at time of writing)
System — 50Hz-25KHz, 4-ohm, 2-watts each RMS speakers, USB powered, 70mm squared, 494 grams.
More info and ordering — Arctic Cooling
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P531This headset with attached microphone is designed for 5.1 gaming. There are four drivers per ear (20hz-25Khz) plus vibration, which you would imagine would give you pretty good sound, with bass down to 20Hz plus a sub channel down to 12Hz. I didn’t think 12Hz was low enough to be sub, it’s just bass to me. My Apple In-Ear Speakers go down to 12Hz, and they certainly aren’t ‘sub’ (they're great, though).
I’m not sure what games actually supports this multichannel stuff, on Macs anyway. Call of Duty used to let you set the type of sound output (surround, stereo, Miles ...) but Call of Duty 2 and 4 do not, they just process sound without giving you control, and Day of Defeat on Steam was just, er, whatever sound, and hardly a good test.
Confusingly, the remote has volume dials for each ‘channel’ – rear, front, overall volume, sub and centre, plus a switch that turns the mic on or off. This is only confusing in that it’s really hard too figure out which is which when you’re gaming – even if you use the time before spawning to change settings, you really have to have enough light and stare at the controller so see what’s what.
And it’s ‘illuminated’, sure, but this actually just means there’s a glowing blue strip in the middle of it. That’s good to locate the controller in the gloom, maybe, and to let you know it has power, but this does nothing to help you locate the controls. I reckon the controls – assuming they did anything – should all have a different feel so you can tell what’s what without looking. But that was academic, because with a Mac anyway, all I got was a huge volume boost from the Front controller and nothing from the others, apart from overall volume from the annoying spring-back Volume control. So the Sub, Rear and Centre dials don't even need to be on it., as far as Mac users are concerned. One would hope this works as advertised with the right sound cards in PCs, but there doesn’t seem to be anything to engage these channels on Macs. Likewise the vibration that’s built in – that didn’t happen.
Note, there is a CD of drivers in the packet, but it's all PC stuff.
That said, sound processing sounded tight and accurate. It was slightly over-processed in music, but my little test suite of tracks, which stresses the hell out of some earbuds, was handled smoothly with no distortion.
The microphone is on a flexible stalk so you can position it for comfortable hands-free talking or push it out of the way. Audio seemed clear, from what MadMacs clan members were telling me, anyway. But then, all I could hear from them was ‘I got you’ and what they heard clearly from me was mostly ‘Aargh!’, plus some other things I won’t repeat here.
You need small ears though – I’ve never considered mine were all that big but I can hardly get them into the cups. After a half hour gaming, my ears were sore and I had to remove them.
That said, although the construction is grey plastic, on the phones themselves it’s fairly heavy duty and the padding in the headband is verging on lavish. The controller, by contrast, is kinda cheap to the feel and eye, so I’d wonder how much life it would offer, considering how gamers thrash things.
I guess they could also be used for Skype calls, etc.
What’s great — good sound
What’s not — largely irrelevant controller, and ear cups to small
Needs — 5.1 channel engagement on Macs to make ’em really sing.
4/10
What — Arctic Sound P531 US$66.55 (about NZ$95)
System — USB headset, four drivers per ear, 12Hz-20KHz, microphone
Contact — Arctic Sound
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P311 Bluetooth headsetThe ARCTIC Sound P311 is a wireless headset for laptops, mobile phones or music players. It has a microphone for calls or taking voice memos (a discreet slit on the right ’phone) and it comes with a travel case, The joints above each ear cup bend completely in so you can fold it to fit the case.
The little ear cups sit on your ears rather than trying to fit over them.
The headband is sprung and goes behind your upper neck, and should fit most heads (Arctic reckons).
Though not someone with big hair, I imagine.
The compact headset weighs only 71g, despite having sone kind of chargeable power storage onboard – you charge this with an included USB cable which plugs in under a slide-aside cover on the right earpiece. Once charged, Arctic claims 20 hours talk time and up to 400 hours standby.
The headset features Bluetooth v2.1+EDR, in which it supports secure simple Bluetooth pairing. On your Mac, open System Preferences, click Bluetooth (third row down), and then the Plus sign at lower left. The Bluetooth Setup Assistant should appear and in that, your headset should show up as ‘P311’ once you’ve held the Telephone button in constantly for seven-plus seconds (it will beep).
The connection status is indicated by a blue LED light on the headphone (it’s red while charging).
I could not make my Mac see the headset at all – it found an iMac in the next room, but not the headset just centimetres away. Same with my iPhone – but then I read the instructions again. Right, it has to be fully charged first. So I fully charged it, and voila, all good – it listed in the System Prefs Bluetooth panel as P311 Headset immediately. Actually, it also listed as P311 Headphones. Headphones sounded perfect, but when I clicked on Headset, sound was distorted.
Using Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP) technology, the P311 is supposed to ensure clear and undistorted digital sound quality. I can vouch for that – no distortion on the tracks that have defeated other headsets, yet I could still hear the difference between a lesser 128KBPS track and it’s better 255KBPS version. And it sounded as good on a classical track as on pumping pop, rock and alternative tracks.
Unlike the controller of the somewhat flawed gaming headset, the controls on the right earpiece fall readily to hand and it’s easy to turn volume up and down by feel, plus skip or replay on the little nubs that project top and bottom from the dial. Stopping and starting a track is as simple as pressing the big main multifunction button in the middle.
The headset incorporates Clear Voice Capture (CVC) technology, which is supposed to clearly extract a user’s voice from a mixture of unwanted background noises. This would immensely increase the quality when making calls. Sceptically, I tested it in a room with a noisy radio on loudly, along with the sounds of a full-on construction site, which is what next door has become lately with six tradesmen busy 7:30-5 daily.
I am pleased to say the P311s worked as advertised – whenever I spoke, the extraneous noises disappeared, and this was quite a feat considering the power tools and hammering next door, along with the loud radio playing in the room that they had to cope with.
The Arctic Sound P311 is rechargeable via USB cable and can serve up to 20 hours of playback time from a full charge.
What’s great — once they’re paired, they work as advertised with excellent sound quality. Without a headband but with a back-band sort of thing, I can even wear them with my hat!
What’s not — the USB cable connector cover flicks off too easily.
Needs — anyone who wants high quality audio combined with wireless hands-free
9/10
Arctic Sound P311 Bluetooth headset, US$37.95 online (about NZ$54)
System — Bluetooth V.2.1+EDR Class 2 neckband headphones with controller on on eear (Stop, Start, Skip, Replay and volume up/down), profiles supported include A2DP, AVRCP, HSP, HFP 1.5, range up to 20 metres, Talk Time up to 20 hours, Standby Time up to 400 hours, Weight 71.2 grams.
Contact — Arctic Sound
