Icemat Siberia

First Impressions
This product came in very nice packaging, similar to the 5H's. Inside the package is the headset, the microphone attached to a volume control device and 3ft of cable, a 3.5mm to 6.5mm headphone jack adapter, the USB sound card, and a 5-pin mini-USB cable to connect the sound card to the computer. The setup process for the USB card was just as painless as it was with the 5H, and the user interface was nearly identical.

Design
The Siberia is a closed-ear headset, and it lets through much less noise than the 5H's, though it still doesn't completely block out all external noise like a noise-canceling headset. A neat design feature is that the inside of each speaker is slanted, to better conform to the outward slant that people's ears have. In addition, to improve comfort, the Siberia does away with the traditional method of resizing the headset to conform to a person's head size. Instead of a simple sliding mechanism like on the 5Hs or the PC150s, the headset adjusts automatically to your head with a band that rests on top of it that is then secured to each speaker with retractable wires. The wires are pulled out and maintain enough tension to keep the headset perfectly positioned on your ears while letting the band rest lightly on your head. This method makes the fairly heavy Siberias feel like feathers on your head. It's not hard to literally forget you're wearing them. It's very important to note that the microphone does NOT attach directly to this headset; it is an independent part of this headphone setup.

The headset has a thick, 2 foot headphone cord coming from it, which is designed to connect to a volume control device. This device has a 6 foot cord coming from it, and can either go straight into your computer or to the USB sound device. The microphone cord is also attached to this cord with rubber clamps, but can be very easily removed. The headphone cord itself is 10 feet long. The microphone on the end has a clip on it to attach to a shirt collar or shirt pocket or anything else that is clip-able, but it is more of a hassle to get set up than the 5H's retractable microphone. The USB sound device has clearly labeled buttons on it for increasing or decreasing microphone volume incrementally, as well as a mute button.

As stated before, the 5H appears to be designed solely for gaming with listening to music and other multimedia functions as a bit of an afterthought. With the Siberias, it seems the exact opposite is true from a design perspective. The lack of any built-in microphone, as well as the inclusion of a professional 6.5mm headphone jack leads me to believe that this headset was really designed for use in professional audio creation. It simply isn't as tailored to gaming, design-wise, as the 5H is.

Sound
From a gaming point of view, the sound on the Siberia is every bit the match of the 5H. It provides the same levels of bass and clarity of sound that the 5H does, and in some cases, even does it better. Even if the design doesn't have much appeal to gamers, it doesn't slouch at all in sound quality. If you can go without a conveniently placed mic, then the Siberias are every bit as great of a headset for games as the 5Hs are. But where the Siberia really comes into its own is music.

In order to test the sound quality of these headsets when playing music, I opted to listen to Beethoven's 9th Symphony on all three pairs. Since many in the world consider the 9th to be the greatest aural achievement of western civilization, it made perfect sense. The way the Siberia produces this musical piece is... beyond words. It blows away the 5H and every other headset I've ever used in my life. You can close your eyes and just feel like you're in the middle of the orchestra, watching everyone play. The background noise it produces are nearly inaudible, a far cry from the 5Hs, and an even further step from the PC150s. The notes themselves are as crisp as they were the day it was first performed. There is not enough praise I can give the Siberias in their musical quality. They're simply the best.