INTRODUCTION

   Well it seems that we've enjoyed more PC game titles inside November than the entire 2013 and so as mentioned a few weeks ago we decided to take advantage of that in order to test some of the game peripherals we have here. Now normally it takes us around a week to test a game related peripheral but that applies only when there aren't really many games for us to play and so for example i usually mostly focus on Planetside 2 while the others play Metro Last Light and Fallout 3 along with all its expansions. This month however things are different since not only did i have time to finish Call Of Duty Ghosts, X-Com Enemy Within and Batman Origins but I’m still playing Battlefield 4 and X: Rebirth (until the Alpha of Star Citizen/Squadron 42 by Chris Roberts gets available this is the best alternative) so I’ve actually managed to use quite a few game peripherals. One of those is the latest Tunguska 7.1 Virtual Surround USB Gaming Headset by a rather new company called Attitude One.

   Attitude One was founded in USA in 2011. With many years of experience from the computer and gaming business we decided to start Attitude One. Thanks to our knowledge and our connections in the industry, we can offer products and technologies that are always top of the line. With our unique design and memorable product names our products spread throughout markets of the world.

   Manufacturing a headset is not really something hard nowadays since in a nutshell you just need to pick the size of the drivers (usually 40-50mm ones), audio configuration (Stereo-"real" Surround), type of microphone (omnidirectional-noise cancelling) and finally decide whether or not you want to pair it with a USB soundcard to give it the virtual surround feature (used with stereo configuration). Well it seems that for the Tunguska 7.1 Attitude One decided to follow a much used path by combining two 40mm drivers (stereo) featuring a frequency response of 20Hz-20KHz, 32Ohm Impendence and 111dB (-+3) sensitivity with an omnidirectional microphone (50Hz-5kHz/54dB +-3) and a USB soundcard (virtual surround) so nothing really new here. However leaving out the specifications we were very pleased with the design of the headset and after using it for 4 full days i can say that the Tunguska 7.1 Virtual Surround USB Gaming Headset is not just looks.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

Attitude One ships the Tunguska 7.1 inside an orange box with a large product picture at the front with the main features right beneath it and the color selection next to it.

The specifications of the headset are placed on the left side.

Much like most game peripherals the front of the box opens up like a book revealing a large company logo and part of the unit behind two clear plastic windows.

Aside the headset you will also get the user's manual and a mini software CD.

THE TUNGUSKA 7.1

Thanks to the lightweight materials used the headset weighs just 365g and is currently available in two color combinations white/blue and white/orange.

To see exactly how large the headset is we placed it right next to the quite small Jabra REVO Wireless.

Attitude One has placed their logo on the exterior of both earcups.

The omnidirectional microphone has a vertical rotation of around 130 degrees and is not flexible.

Both earcups feature leatherette coated earpads and soft cloth interiors.

The headband extends up to 3cm on both sides via 8 increments however there are no visible markings on it.

Here we see that instead of a single headpad the Tunguska 7.1 features 4 small ones covered with leatherette.

There's also a small in-line volume controller that also allows you to mute both the headphones and the microphone.

Unfortunately although the Tunguska 7.1 comes with a nice 3m long braided cable the USB connector is not gold plated.

USING THE TUNGUSKA 7.1

Although the headset comes with a mini CD that contains the driver package i suggest downloading the latest version from their page.

There are two LEDs on the outside of each earcup and one LED at the center of the in-line volume controller that light up once you plug the headset to your system.

We've used many headsets using Xear technology USB surround cards so the control panel is not new to us. As always through here you can enable/disable and configure the surround sound mode (2/4/6/8 channels), set the DSP for each channel, adjust the volume levels of both the headphones and the microphone (you can also mute them), play with the equalizer or choose one of the presets, you can make use of one of the default environment settings and finally you can enable/disable the karaoke mode.

CONCLUSION

   There's a reason behind the increasing number of virtual surround headsets lately and that's mainly because they combine positioning audio by using two standard drivers at a fraction of the price you'd need to purchase a "real" surround headset with multiple smaller drivers in each earcup. Of course most of the times you get what you pay for and so the majority of the virtual surround headsets out there offer mediocre positioning audio at best which is also why i prefer to use them as regular stereo headsets. Fortunately the Tunguska 7.1 Virtual Surround USB Gaming Headset did better in that area than i had expected however it didn't manage to impress us with its overall audio quality. So although it offers very good mid clarity the high end is a bit lacking in depth and accuracy while the bass is not even close to what I’d call rich something which we come across often with headsets that utilize 40mm drivers. Of course in games the above is not very important since positioning audio and overall clarity matter most but if you plan on listening to your favorite tracks or watching movies the Tunguska 7.1 is not ment for you. Moving to the overall quality of the headset although it's made primarily by hard plastic we found it to be quite flexible and comfortable to wear for many ours so that combined with its design give it quite a few points. The microphone also worked quite well although we did encounter some distortion at first which went away shortly after.

   As with almost every new manufacturer out there Attitude One has yet to expand everywhere so the Tunguska 7.1 Virtual Surround USB Gaming Headset is currently only available in the EU for a price tag of 69.90Euros (Alternate). That price tag lands the Tunguska 7.1 quite higher than many other similar virtual surround headsets from a large number of manufacturers that offer similar levels of audio quality so in the end it's more about what you like most in terms of design than anything else. Personally i do like what Attitude One has done with the Tunguska 7.1 Virtual Surround USB Gaming Headset in terms of design but i can't say that i was impressed with its sound performance. Sure it's worth a chance if you're out to get a headset to use mostly with games but just like most virtual surround headsets out there it doesn't offer anything groundbreaking. Still if this is the very first attempt by Attitude One to make a virtual surround headset then who knows, we may see a "real" surround headset from them sooner rather than later.

PROS

- Build Quality (Overall)
- Design
- Positioning Audio Accuracy
- 3m Braided Cable
- Lightweight

CONS

- Price (For Some)
- Audio Quality (Bass & Highs)