[section_title title=”Performance”]Â Performance
The first thing I noticed with the Ceres 500 was how comfy it is. I touched upon the around-ear design earlier on, but the Ceres 500 truly provide a comfortable fit and seal around your ear. I didn’t have the feeling of my ears being squashed or that the Ceres 500 needed adjusting for maximum performance all the time – just a case of set it and forget it. Further to this point, the seal offered by the design means that you’re left interruption free from background noises all whilst being fed your own private audio stream. Whilst the cups do have a mesh over them i’m not sure if they’re as ‘breathable’ as the Ceres 500 web page makes out, on the other hand, I didn’t get warm ears as is usually the case with closed back headphones.
Before getting down to the nitty-gritty of test scenarios, Coolermaster’s volume control is the most functional of the USB headsets I’ve reviewed. The Klipsch and Ozone offerings both felt like they had limited control over volume and the increments by which you could increase and decrease. The Klipsch and Ozone were still ‘loud’ at low volume settings to the extent i’d have to remove the headset to hear someone speaking even at ‘2’ volume in Windows. I encountered no such problems with the Ceres 500’s volume wheel and combined with the Windows slider, offered me a lot more control over volume than the other headsets did
The audio quality from the Ceres 500 is equally awesome too. There doesn’t appear to be any forced processing going on with the Ceres 500 like there was with the Onda Pro and it tells. For music you can definitely get the sense of a strong stereo performance from either cup , whether it’s for bassy affairs, vocal heavy tracks. Switching between the laid back debut album from London Grammar ‘If You Wait’ and more intricate material such as Arcade Fire’s ‘Reflektor’ poses no problems for the Ceres 500, especially with the latter intertwining subtle dance and RnB influences into their instrument heavy tracks.
On the video front, the Ceres 500 performed great, if not a lot better than the Onda Pro. Watching the same test scenes over in House of Cards there was no muffle, no sense that the characters were in a different room to what is happening on screen. Voices remain clear and have good direction to them – ideal for a program like House of Cards. The Ceres 500 doesn’t have any of the echo hangover the Onda Pro seemed to suffer from and whereas scenes take place at conference tables and living rooms whilst listening with the Ceres 500, the same scenes always sounded like they’re taking place in a hall with the overly-processed Onda.
Moving onto the majorly important point of gaming, I believe the Ceres 500 are stand out performers here also. Battlefield 4’s gun sounds, vehicle noise and all around ambiance of carnage sounds great with the Ceres 500. There was no sensation of being detached form the immediate action that’s on screen like the Onda Pro had due to very limited processing going on with the Ceres 500. Interiors such as Op Metro and Op Locker didn’t suffer from any sort of enforced echo, and as a result meant that your aural feedback was near reference material as far as projecting where shots and character VOs are coming from.
Building on top of this, League of Legends followed the foundations laid down by Battlefield 4 where clarity was front and centre – the best outcome for a game where communication is paramount and one where playing with random players is usually devoid of any. It’s in League of Legends where you can get a proper feel of how the voice capability of the Ceres 500 holds up too. Playing with a partner over Skype presented no muddling of game and chat sounds and the person I was playing with didn’t mention anything about my voice quality being any different from my desktop mic – a massive boon for the Ceres’ bundled mic.
Overall the performance of the Ceres 500 was superb and on immediate comparison to to other headsets I’ve reviewed, arguably punching above its weight.
What do I think of the Ceres 500 overall and is it worth your time – time to find out.
