Sennheiser HD555
Weighing in at $124.99 Newegg prices, the HD555s aren’t for gaming. At least, they weren’t designed with that even remotely in mind, it seems. It doesn’t have an in-line volume control; it comes default with a 1/4th inch plug, and has no mic. However, we’ll tell you right now it gets our unequivocal recommendation as a gaming headset. Why? The same reason a gaming computer is great at photo and video editing. If it’s designed to do the hardest thing imaginable, easier things are just done better. Catering to a picky audiophile is a risky business, and it’s one that Sennheiser treads in with a million other competitors. Their HD555 is a fan-favorite, because it pleases this crowd. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, with us being the male geese. So let’s take a closer look at the HD555s and see what’s going on with them.

Game Audio

The HD555s is one of the most popular non-headset audio devices used by gamers. As such, we wanted to give due attention to the gaming aspect of this headset. For a quick ballpark, we found them to be great - but not amazing. Let’s start with noise separation. The HD555s can accomplish task admirably, and this is a great boon to PC gamers everywhere. Knowing where your enemy is half the battle, and these headphones go a long way to helping you out. Though we didn’t have an X-Fi on hand, we believe hooking one of these up to the virtual 7.1 offered by the X-Fi would lead to the ultimate in positional audio, and make the day of any gamer. The quality of the individual sounds wasn’t as good as their positioning, unfortunately. The noise crackling of the HD435 wasn’t present, but the generally flat response was. There was very little bass support to any of the sounds that DoD produces. Naturally, we checked to see if it was a limitation of our game, but our Icemat Siberia didn’t have any troubles in that range. The final thing to figure out was how crisp the sounds were. The answer is “very.” Footsteps, individual shots, grenade primes, everything was as clear as day. When we fired a fully automatic weapon, the shots didn’t blend together like they do on lower end headphones; every individual shot came through perfectly. If you’re willing to forgive the lack of bass in games, and there are many gamers who don’t like bass anyways, these are the perfect headphones for you.

Music Audio

Where the HD435s were decent, the HD555s are great. Where the HD435s were good, the HD555s are AMAZING. Let’s start at the beginning of our Beethoven piece again. Like the HD435s, the 555s bring a very solid but not overdone bass response. The difference comes out in the clarity. Any high-end headset can bring you a solid, on-key bass note. It takes a special kind to make that note a clear as an Austrian mountain lake. When the cellos hit their louder notes, you don’t just hear the note. You hear the vibrations of the individual strings of the instrument, you hear it resonating through the cello’s box, you hear the instrument as pure as you possibly can short of standing inside of it. There really is no real way to better describe it - it is as pure as pure gets. Then the middle melody starts. The HD555s do an excellent job of bringing the different instruments from different locations. The violas playing the main melody in the middle of your head, and you can clearly hear the bassoon playing around it from the right to the left and back as it provides the counter. All the while, the cellos are providing the support from the back of your head. The music stays are crisp and pure as it did in the previous section. It is the best we’ve ever heard a device reproduce. The violins hit, and they are perfectly in key, while the trumpets provide the accents on the important notes. Even at the high volume of this area of the song, the sound remains true and untouched. Even for headphones with the HD555s reputation, we were impressed. So far in our existence as GotFrag Hardware, we haven’t heard better.