Ezonics ESound 5.1 Review

Ezonics brings true six-channel surround sound to headphones with their ESound 5.1, featuring a USB connection and six individual sound chambers.

Summary

Overall, the ESound did a good job of producing actual surround sound in supported movies and games. Stereo music also sounded good, and even games without 5.1 surround sound audio benefited from the ESound solution.

Bass response was excellent, but at times too much and had to be turned down. With a few refinements, Ezonics would have a hard-to-beat product.

Six-channel sound in gaming is a reality and Ezonics has done a great job bringing that reality to a headset. We look forward to future versions that address our concerns but definitely think the ESound is a great start.

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Introduction

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Computer audio and video is constantly
evolving and we’re currently on the cusp of another evolution. With games
becoming more and more immersive on the graphics side, the next logical step is
digital surround sound.

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"> 

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">While movies have been doing it for years,
video games are just starting to support 3D positional audio. There are many
5.1, 6.1 and even 7.1 channel sound cards and speaker sets on the market today,
and now we are starting to see surround sound headphones.

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"> 

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">The idea of 5.1 channel headphones is a
fairly new concept that is getting a lot of exposure lately. Several companies
have come out with 5.1 channel headphones, with most of them being an analog
solution requiring three separate plugs to carry the signal.

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"> 

face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Ezonics is a company that hopes to tap into
this new computer audio market with their ESound 5.1 surround sound headphones.
The ESound headphones have an MSRP of $149 dollars but we’ve seen them on the
Web for as little as $99.

src="http://reviews.designtechnica.com/images/reviews/ezonics/esound/esound_1.jpg"
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The ESound 5.1 channel headphones from
Ezonics.

Design and Function

The design of the ESound 5.1 surround headphones by Ezonics is quite different than the others. The ESound utilizes a USB connection with an inline 5.1 decoder so a 5.1 channel sound card is not needed