Zalman ZM-RS6F Headphones Review

Introduction





If you're any kind of gamer, you know the value of sound; that a quality soundcard is just as important as a quality video card. Determining the direction, distance, and relative position of any given sound above the chaotic ambience, gunfire, and ranting of your teammates on voice coms can be the key to your success. It can also be the key to your eviction if you're still blaring those damn speakers at all odd hours of the night. Or, perhaps you're out the door to your next LAN party, but those rockin' Logitech Z-680's you just bought are a big no-no. What, then, is one to do? Headphones would seem the obvious solution - but as for quality? Not so much, unless you're keen on spending this month's rent to pick up something halfway decent. Right?







Leave it to Zalman, a company previously known strictly for its silent fans and other cooling accessories, to bring the convenience of headphones and the quality of a 6 channel speaker setup together in one beautiful marriage: the ZM-RS6F. These sleek, stylish headphones are the first of their kind to bring the real surround experience to headphones. With 3 speakers (front, center, and rear) in each lobe, gone is the need for simulation a la Digital Signal Processing (DSP). Sounds good on paper, but do they hold up to the tests of an avid FPS nut? Read on.


Testing

For testing, I utilized several mp3's in addition to games in order to test the full range of highs, mids, and lows:

First off, here are the technical specifications (Tested on a Sound Blaster Audigy Gamer):

Unit TypeElectro Dynamic Round Type Micro SpeakerFrequency Response50Hz ~ 20KHz (Extension Effective)Sound Pressure Level89 dB +/- 3 dB at 50mWImpedance16 Ohm at 1KHzNominal Power0.02WMaximum Power0.15WWeight11.24oz (316.8g) without packagingCordStraight, Triple entry 9.8ft (300cm)Plug3 headphone jacks ( 3.5mm)
Music
Lynyrd Skynyrd - Freebird
Tool - Lateralus
A Perfect Circle - The Package
Evanescence - Bring Me to Life

Games
Call of Duty
Jedi Academy

Results

First let me say this: should you venture to pick up a set of these phones, let me forewarn you that the initial experience will be quite different from what you might expect. These sound nothing like typical headphones or speakers at all. The separation between all 6 channels is seemingly over-subtle. The sound actually feels as if it's resonating within your own head, not churning out of the headphones themselves. You won't truly begin to appreciate the quality this set produces until you hop into a server, start fragging away like mad, and forget that you're wearing a set of alleged surround sound headphones. Once you do, you'll eventually realize that it's extremely easy to subconsciously triangulate exactly where sounds are coming from, and immediately snap in that direction. It's a difference you won't take for granted, and will never want to retreat from.



When playing music, the sound came across clear and crisp. I experienced little to no distortion or hissing when turning the up the volume, a common frustration experienced with speakers. The default bass is a little weaker than I would have liked, but nothing that can't be tweaked via a little equalizer action. The highs came in crisp and clear, and the mids were well defined. While songs certainly sound great using these headphones, this shouldn't be the selling point for anyone - I'm sure that higher quality studio headphones would serve this purpose in and of itself much better. Gaming is where this product truly shines.



Playing Call of Duty with the Theatre 6 headphones was fantastic. In wide open, camping sniper-fest maps like mp_hurtgen, the ability to immediately "spot" the crack of a rifle proved an asset one should never be without. The ambient chatter of gunfire and artillery actually sounded, well, ambient. On more close-quarter maps, these badboys proved their worth even more. I was immediately sold the instant I literally felt shots being fired underneath me. The ability of the 6 speakers to come together and form a complete sound field is truly astounding. I was met with much of the same satisfaction in Jedi Academy. The ambience is incredibly immersive, and the sweeping, bass-filled lightsaber brought new life to the game. Standing in the middle of a lush forest, I simply set the yaw speed low, held down the left arrow key and grinned widely as the sound danced around me in a perfect 360-degree surround experience.


Conclusion

There are a few things we, as gamers, might flag as downfalls to the ZM-RS6F's. First and foremost: no microphone. You'll need to look elsewhere for either a stand-up mic, or else wear your old set around your neck as I do. There is also no volume control on the cord itself, something I'm very surprised to find absent in such an otherwise complete product. These are more annoyances than problematic issues, however, as the pros heavily outweigh the cons. The set is extremely comfortable; padded with a soft leather surface, they completely overlap the ear, thus putting no pressure on the earlobes and allowing you to shoot it up all night pain-free. The convenience of these headphones is only outdone by their practicality, durability, and reasonable price. These phones are highly recommended for avid LAN fanatics, considerate neighbors ( ), and those who don't want to spend a fortune and the personal hassle to set up a 6 speaker system. From silent cooling solutions to booming audio products, Zalman has taken the leap, and succeeded immensely - certainly someone to keep a close eye on in the future.

• Approximate Price: 50$ USD
  
• Official Product Link
  

This should be great for channeling a 5.1 sound source into a pair of headphones like a from a DVD. But for gaming, the best 3D sound possible comes from using normal 2-channel headphones with your soundcard set to headphones.

In the case of gaming your using hardware to undo what was done to turn the signal into 5.1. It's a waste of processing power and hardware.

I hope this isn't a future trend to over-feature things because they market well.

now all it needs is a microphone

yes stryk 2 channels are much better than 5.1 .......... its a good thing i have this audigy so i can play all the coolest games in 2 channels maybe ill turn eax off while im at it too. These were reviewed by on tomshardware.com maybe a month ago, they gave it very good ratings for gaming, not so good for music, but they comparing them to $200 hifi headphones.
over-feature? my 5.1 speakers rock for gaming, i can pinpoint anything in a heart beat, i only use headphones for ravenshield so i can hear footsteps better. why not take the best of both worlds? so long as it works the way it is supposed to, which has been claimed by a number of sources, this is a GREAT idea.
Post edited by =VD=B_Mean2mE at 11/5/2003 11:54:43 PM

Originally posted by: Stryk
In the case of gaming your using hardware to undo what was done to turn the signal into 5.1. It's a waste of processing power and hardware.

Not true. Most games for the last few years have had 4 channel sound, and some of the newer ones have 5.1 sound. And unless you're using onboard sound, it doesn't use any CPU power at all, all the work is done by the digatal to analogue converter (DAC) chip on your sound card (unless you're using an extnernal digital decoder, in which case the digital decoder does the work)
Post edited by Crimson Fury at 11/6/2003 5:05:57 AM

Zalman are going to be releasing a microphone for these babies toward the end of the year.

http://www.zalman.co.kr/english/board/board.htm

They should also be releasing a seperate headphone amp for them but if you check out http://www.mmgear.com you will see that there is already one made (along with some suspiciously similar looking headphones...) whcih you should be able to buy.

Getting hold of these headphones in the UK can be done from http://www.quietpc.co.uk who I also believe are going to be stocking the headphone amp.

For the rest of the EU I have found a french website but that is all so far but I'm sure that there is an office in Germany too.. if only i could speak German

Originally posted by: =VD=B_Mean2mE
yes stryk 2 channels are much better than 5.1 .......... its a good thing i have this audigy so i can play all the coolest games in 2 channels maybe ill turn eax off while im at it too. These were reviewed by on tomshardware.com maybe a month ago, they gave it very good ratings for gaming, not so good for music, but they comparing them to $200 hifi headphones.
over-feature? my 5.1 speakers rock for gaming, i can pinpoint anything in a heart beat, i only use headphones for ravenshield so i can hear footsteps better. why not take the best of both worlds? so long as it works the way it is supposed to, which has been claimed by a number of sources, this is a GREAT idea.

I'm sorry. I was only born with two ears. I guess if you 5 ears, this would matter.

Your brain is two channel. Left ear and Right ear. With the proper processing from your soundcard and regular 2-channel headphones you can get 3D spacial effects as good as anything else can do it. And with the way DirectSound & EAX works, they are capable of doing this. Whether or not you have a good enough sound card to do it is another matter. If you want to run speaker then yes get a 5.1,6.1, or 7.1. If you're using headphones, you only need and only should have 2 channels.

To change the sound to 5.1 it requires breaking up the sound source into several channels and making assumptions about the proper channel mixing and position. Basically you now have several discrete sound sources attempting to simulate a 3D spacial sound field. For these headphones, you have to recombine those channels back to a left and right ear. It looks (from the pics) like they've chosen to use several small speakers and to let the mixing occur in your ear canal. Again assumptions in positioning have been made.

They basically could have save the trouble and gone straight to 2-channel without the added distortion of going into several channels and back again.


Post edited by Stryk at 11/6/2003 1:53:38 PM

- Stryk -
The claim that your brain is two channel, "left ear and right ear" , is a huge oversimplification. Your brain does not determine the position of a sound merely by the differences that can be simulated by normal 2-channel headphones (i.e. interaural time difference, head shadow, etc.), but also relies on other factors. In fact, even with one ear it is possible to determine the position of a sound. If this is too difficult to believe, try this, plug one ear (with your finger, or with an earplug if you must) then close your eyes and have someone stand near you and snap their fingers, or clap their hands. You will still be able to determine the position of the sound (at least roughly). This is due to other auditory localization cues that are not dependent on both ears. These are the cues that are benefited by 6 channel sound.
Also, you claim that for these headphones they must split up the 2-channel sound into 6 channels. This is not precisely true. With older games, such as my current personal favorite, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, that were originally encoded in 2 channels, there may be little difference between these and a comparable set of 2-channel headphones... though even then, I wouldn't expect these to be worse, as the EAX you spoke of should be just as good at producing positionable sound in 6-channels as it does in 2-channels. More relevant, though, are the newer games, such as a game I should have bought by now, Call of Duty, that are originally encoded in either 4-, 5-, or as is becoming popular now 6-channel sound. In these cases, with 2-channel headphones, you are relying on your sound processor to convert this sound to 2-channels and are then limited to only some of the auditory localization cues that the brain uses to position sound. However, in these cases, where the sound is originally in 4 or more channels, if a, as we are discussing here, 6-channel headphone set is used your ear is able to take advantage of nearly every localization cue it would use in normal conditions ("in the outside world", if you will).
Now, it is true that just because it is 6 channels it isn't necessarily better (i.e. more easy to position sounds); however, if done well, and with a source similarly well-done (though a poor source will adversely affect positioning regardless of the number of channels; so, really more relevant as far as the source goes is how it is originally encoded), 6-channel headphones will allow you to much more easily position sounds. And, as stated in every review of these headphones that I have seen, they are done well. And so, depending on the specific source, these will either allow for easier and more precise sound positioning, or will prove to be merely no worse than normal headphones. In this review the game Call of Duty is used as an example: this game is originally encoded in at least 4 channels, and so, use of these headphones can only be beneficial.

- Misterhopman -

Actually what you brain uses to determine positions is

1) frequency content change with position. You ear has the narly shape for a reason. There are certain frequencies get attenuated depending on the position of the sound direction relative to you head.
2) Sound difference between the left and right ear. Because of the minute difference time it takes sound to travel to each ear, there's a phase shift between the sound entering the two ears. There's also an amplitude difference depending on how much your head is blocking the sound to one ear.

That's it. That's how your brain interprets position. These are things that can be simulated through processing and played back to each ear. What's more important is that it can be done digitally without much degradation in quality since your not relying on analog hardware. Therefore when it comes to finally put this back through hardware, you can get very high quality hardware (grados, senn, etc.).

I work with an $80,000 version of a system that uses what I described. Its amazing. First time you hear it, its a notch or two below sex. Nothing I have ever heard 5.1 or whatever even holds a candle to it. It $80,000 because it does other things than playback and does them with precision that exceeds that of most recording studios. Its also $80,000 because they were the first people to implement the above system commercially and therefore this company became the standard. However, what they do can be done with a Audigy if the drivers are available.

The above 5.1 system is using much more hardware to accomplish the same thing. The extra hardware either means more $$$ or lower quality. I also doubt the proximity of the speakers in the above 5.1 system is properly capturing the positional effects. Also there is a consequence of having the speakers close to your head that will affect the frequency content of the sound. Normal headphones avoid this by pumping sound directly into the ear canal. This can be compensated for somewhat, but there will be a difference for different headshapes. Someone with a large head that is flattish on the sides will get a different effect than someone with a small roundish head.

The problem I have is that it markets well. People are fooled by what sounds the 'bestest' thing going. Whearas my approach, good quality headphones and some drivers, is a hard sell as a marketting feature eventhough it is the superior approach. Therefore game maker, and sound card makers aren't doing the right thing they're doing what sells.

So someone like myself will have to wait several years for everyone else to realize that a little processing and good 2-channel headphones are your best opportunity to recreate 3D sound. Meanwhile that technology stagnates or stays expensive and rare.
Post edited by Stryk at 11/6/2003 6:57:18 PM

I bought a pair of these about a month ago and I'll never go back. I play Raven Shield and I have used 2 channel headphones and 5.1 Surround Sound speakers with my Audigy 2 and neither of them compare. These headphones really put you in the game and allow your ears localization abilities to do what they do best. Also, as a side note, they are extrememly comfortable even for extended sessions. I was a little concerened with the weight at first, but you don't really notice them after play begins.

Has someone used some high quality Sony's, Grado's or Senn's and compared them to these headphones? If so, start your review!

I have these headphones, and yes i agree I will never go back to regular headphones for gaming. I use these for Americas Army and when regular headphones I could hear the difference of people walking on wood or concrete and would have to guess at what direction, but with these Zalmans, AA has AEX option and I can tell which direction fire is coming from and foot steps. If somone is comeing from the left rear of me, I can hear it. All i have to do is turn in the direction and I can hear the foot steps in both ears which tellse me that the guy is directly in front of me. There awesome and has helped my game play a lot. Expecially when people are shooting. Most of the time you don't know from what direction but put these headphones on and bam you know exactly what direction. When somone throws a nade and you hear it land you know what direction to run.
The AEX option is great too. I Weapons cache, if your in the north hallway every thing echos, foot steps, gun fire, etc. These headphones are awesome. I just hope the next version come out with volume control, and and the bass is kinda weak on these.
Post edited by Skunk_Spray at 3/29/2004 11:57:14 AM


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