Electronics : Creative Labs EF0210 Fatal1ty USB Gaming Headset with Sound Blaster X-Fi Technology (Black)

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from: Creative Labs

: Creative Labs EF0210 Fatal1ty USB Gaming Headset with Sound Blaster X-Fi Technology (Black)

List Price: $79.99
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Binding: Electronics
Brand: Creative
Color: Black
EAN: 0054651153974
Label: Creative Labs
Manufacturer: Creative Labs
Model: EF0210
Publisher: Creative Labs
Studio: Creative Labs
Warranty: 1 year warranty

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Product Description:
Compete with Creative Fatal1ty USB Gaming Headset Co-Developed with Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. Dominate the competition with 3D positional audio and the power of Sound Blaster X-Fi in a USB gaming headset.The Fatal1ty USB Gaming Headset is designed with comfort in mind for those long gaming sessions, while delivering precision sound and explosive bass in your games. Plus, with the noise-canceling microphone you can be sure your orders will be heard loud and clear by your team.Once you experience the advantage of Sound Blaster X-Fi technology in your gaming sound you'll never want to game without it. With realistic audio environments, and accurate 3D positional surround sound you'll be able to locate your targets before you even see them. Experience sound effects so lifelike you'll swear you're in the game. Plus, your voice communication will be crystal clear, so your teammates will no longer restrict you to radio silence. Get the secret weapon that pro gamers rely on, and enjoy the sweet sound of victory with Sound Blaster X-Fi.



Customer Reviews
Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - How does the Fatal1ty stack up to a professional grade headset?
I've been using the Fatality (or should I say F4t4L1tY?) headset for a few weeks now and tested it under various conditions. I also own several other professional grade headsets such as the Sennheiser HD580 Precision (~$300), the Fostex T20 (~$250) and a pair of Sony MDR-NC60 Noise Canceling Headphones (~$200).

So how does the Creative Fatal1ty headset stack up?

First it has a microphone, so this makes it unique against the other sets I own. I have other microphone headsets like the Sony PSP Skype headsets, a couple of bluetooth earbud style headsets, and a $7 pair of Panasonic wired microphone/earpiece headsets. These all have microphones. The quality of the Fat1lity headsets are far above all of these, in both comfort and microphone quality. I made numerous Skype phone calls from my PC and everyone complimented the voice quality when I asked. Their voice was also crisp and clear coming through the headsets. The fact that the microphone is easily removable from the headsets is a great feature. Everything about the microphone is high quality, from the sturdy secure plug to the metal bendable neck. No complaints.

On the PC, you have to restart any applications that you want to use the headset with. So, for example, if you have winamp started and want to plug in your headset to listen, you will have to close the application and restart it in order to get it to recognize the headset. This is probably true with any usb headset, and not a unique limitation to the Fatal1ty set, however.

I also tested this on my PS3. I have yet to find a suitable bluetooth solution for gaming on the PS3 because everything seems clumsy, uncomfortable, and unreliable. So I hooked up the Fatal1tys to the USB port and gave it a test.

The voice clarity and quality are far above anything else I have used on the PS3. I had no problems plugging these in and having the PS3 recognize them immediately. I went to the system menu and choose the Creative headsets, turned the microphone volume all the up to 5, and everything worked fine.

One major problem though... there seems to be no way to get the PS3 to output any sound other than the voice to the headset though! So both my ears are covered up, the game sound effects and music are coming from the regular speakers, and the other players voice are coming through the headsets. This is not really a viable solution, so for use with a PS3 I would have to suggest you pass, unless you are only interested in voice chat.

I also listened to a wide range of music through the Fat1lity headsets on my PC. The sound quality really impressed me, and I am hard to please in this regard. While the clarity and crispness did not approach the level of my Sennheiser HD580s, it came A LOT closer than I expected it to. For the money, you would be very hard pressed to do better than the Creative Fat1lity headphones for music. The bass was deep and tight, the plucks of the guitar were crisp, the human voice came through with surprising clarity... I was really impressed here.

Comfort? Very comfortable even after long listening sessions. I had no problems here at all. Again, not quite up to the standards of the Sennheisers, but there are far more comfortable than the Fostexs I own.

Quality? Here you will recognize that you are buying a cheaper set. There is a lot of thin plastic used, adhesive stickers are used for the "Left "Right" indicators and the "Fat1lity" signature (whoever the hell that is). The usb cable is thick enough, but doesn't come unattached from the headset. One the other hand, they look nice aesthetically and the cloth around the earpieces seem like good quality. The fake leather carrying case is a nice touch that I appreciated.

Overall, I think these headsets are an excellent deal at the price they are offered for PC communications like Skype, for listening to all types of music, and for PC gaming. For the PS3, they are not nearly as useful.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - Good Sound, Poor Fit
I liked the sound quality of these headphones and general build quality, but not the fit.

Sound-wise, they produced deep bass and good-sounding explosions. I didn't find any distortion at higher volume levels either.

On the comfort side, I found them to be too tight. The tight fit is good for some level of noise isolation, but they are not comfortable over the long haul. Unfortunately, this cannot really be adjusted.

Regarding build materials and quality, the headphones are largely made of plastic but still feel sturdy. The cord length is good at about 8 1/2 feet. The cord has a built in volume control, on|off switch, and the connectors seem solid. I did find the detachable microphone a little difficult to plug/unplug, but I wouldn't expect to need to remove it much since it flexes out of the way when needed.

Overall, the headphones are good, but for some comfort may be an issue.


Rating: 3 out of 5 stars - Great sound, cheap hardware.
About 1 week ago I purchased this headset to replace my old Sennheiser headphones for online gaming. The sound quality is on par with my mid range Senns, which was a nice surprise. The bass was deep, and everything else came through crystal clear. Also, from what others have told me, the microphone sounds good with no background noise coming through when I was talking with them.

It was relatively comfortable to wear, considering that I was using it for upwards of 12 hours on the days that I did use it.

The only real down side for this headset is it's poor build quality. Right out of the box, the plastic just felt cheap. Now, not even a week later, I tripped on the cord, headset fell on the floor and broke in 2. Generally I am careful with my electronics, but occasionally things get dropped. I've dropped my Sennheiser headphones quite a bit and they work like the day I got them. These on the other hand, didn't survive.

It is hard to find a good, comfortable headset/microphone combo these days. If only these weren't made so cheaply, they could have been my permanent headset for a long time to come. I don't mean to steer anyone away from these, as they do work well. Just be careful with them... they aren't cheap.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - Wonderful gaming headset, pretty decent headphones
I have been in the market for a new headset for what seems like forever, and finally committed to buying these, since I specifically wanted a "gaming-grade" headset. I went for the USB version because I have dedicated headphones I use for music (I'm a bit of an audiophile) and I didn't want to constantly reach behind my computer to switch the input/output ports. Since my desktop has front-loading USB, I can easily just plug it in and I'm ready to go.

I play World of Warcraft and very recently, Left 4 Dead and use voice chat over 90% of the game in both games. My previous solution was separate headphones/microphone. I could never fully wear my headphones and talk at the same time though, because I could never hear myself talk--which resulted in me basically yelling without even knowing it.

When I first picked these headphones up, the first thing I noticed was how light (and unfortunately, cheap) they felt. I can definitely see myself breaking these if I were to just throw them in a bag for example. I would not recommend these for people who do a lot of mobile gaming.

The pro to them being light is that you can wear them for long periods of time and not be bothered. The felt surrounding the ear is incredibly soft. My ears don't heat up or feel bothered by wearing these for a while.

I plugged in the headphones and they were instantly ready to go, using Windows Vista x64. The sound quality (I have a Creative X-Fi card) is actually pretty good. It's obviously nothing like my professional headphones, but it's great in games and very crisp. I can finally chat with my teammates and hear all the action, without sacrificing one or the other like I had to before.

Note: If you find you're having odd sound troubles, make sure you visit Creative's website, because there is a firmware upgrade for this headphones that supposedly fix issues some people are having. I personally did not have any problem, but I've read a lot of reviews complaining about the product not working at all.

So overall, if you're in the market for a headset designed for gamers without compromising sound quality, I'd recommend these for sure. The only thing keeping me from giving this 5 stars is the light plastic feel of it...I am very careful in handling it, because I'm afraid it might break!




Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - Great Sound and Compatibility
It's been a while since I have tried a headset, and this set turned out to be much better than I expected.

It's mostly made of plastic, giving it a cheap feel, but don't be fooled, the sound quality is actually really good. I really like the detachable mic too, as you may not use it all the time and this allows you to get it out of your way.

I decided to take a different tack than most reviewers, and tried this set out on both Windows and Mac OSX operating systems. Although Windows is the only supported operating system from Creative, it worked well on both. Note: It seems to me that the real reason Windows is explicitly supported, is likely because the drivers provided with the headset, allow you to get the full 3-D X-Fi surround sound with certain Windows games. That said, it works well without the drivers, but lacks the high-end game support.

The first operating system I tried it on was Mac OSX 10.5.5. It was plug and play. I just had to go into System Preferences and set the Input and Output to the headset (displayed as Creative Headset"). THe sound was great and I tried recording with both Adobe Soundbooth and Apple Soundtrack Pro without issue.

Next, I tried the headset on a vmWare Fusion virtual machine (Windows Vista 64-bit). Now, I didn't expect it to work perfectly, since 64-bit Windows always has driver annoyances. But I was surprised to find it worked well and the drivers installed without issue. Both the headset and mic worked great, and again, the sound was impressive. I would recommend a reboot after installing the drivers in any case, it always helps and never hurts to do so.

Finally, I tried booting (via Apple Bootcamp) into a Windows Vista 64-bit Windows session and found the sound and mic worked great without drivers, and still worked with them installed (yeah, I'm surprised about this with 64-bit Windows anything ...).

Unfortunately, I did not have any supported games to try the 3-D Surround sound, but I can say that even without it, I am really impressed with the quality of the headset audio. I can only assume that it's much better running it in Windows with a supported game and using the provided drivers.

I did get to try the headset and mic with Rosetta Stone (German) and found it was really comfortable and worked great. The voice recognition seemed better than anything I had used before (i.e Dragon Naturally Speaking). I have to believe that the mic quality has a lot to dow ith this, since my pronunciation of German could not have been that good.

All in all, I think you get a lot of bang for the buck and would not hesitate to recommend this headset to anyone. The plastic may give it a cheaper feel, but it does not take away from sound quality and is a bit lighter on your head which makes for better long-term use and comfort.


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