Corsair HS60 Haptic Headset Review

Conclusion

Rarely have we seen a product which has such a divisive feature on it. So before we get to the main event, let’s cover the rest of the Corsair HS60 Haptic.

Like the HS50 and HS70 the design of the HS60 Haptic is comfortable and robust. The use of a single piece of steel shaped to not only provide a solid spine to the headband but also a study design upon which to hang the ear pieces combines lightness with rigidity. It’s a very popular headset design and one we’ve had a lot of experience with and can state with authority that it will last until you tire of it. Too often with affordable headsets the hinges would be the first things to give up the ghost, but without any hinges as such it lasts forever with regular use. The headband is well padded and the accented stitching doesn’t just make the Corsair HS60 Haptic look nice when it’s on your desk but helps keep the foam firm rather than wobbly, so the headset always stays exactly where you’ve put it. If you’ve got a headset you’re constantly having to adjust because it moves then you’ll appreciate this. The ear cups themselves are comfortable too with plenty of padding. We usually find that vinyl coverings end up making our ears sweaty during marathon sessions and would normally prefer cloth coverings, but as the main point of the HS60 Haptic is to feed all the bass into your ears with no leakage then it’s a compromise we don’t object to.

Sound quality is the same as that we heard on the Corsair HS50, utilising 50mm Neodymium drivers with 111dB sensitivity and the hugely popular 20Hz-20kHz frequency response. With the Haptic feedback off the sound profile is nice and neutral, although you can of course adjust the equaliser in the iCUE software if you want to tailor it to the quality of your own hearing or personal frequency preferences. Naturally more expensive headsets have a broader sound, or more airy, but the HS60 Haptic is all about focused sounds and everything sounds tight.

The Haptic feedback is going to be the kind of thing you either love or hate. Before testing we felt that a headset with good bass can rattle your fillings enough to not need additional vibration, and wondered exactly what it really would bring to the party. It does, in very specific scenarios, increase your immersion in gaming and with it set sufficiently aggressively it can give you a tiny bit of early warning about enemies and things. It’s not the kind of thing you want to leave on when listening to music, but high action films can also get a bit of a boost thanks to the vibration. Often when dealing with extra features on a product it’s easy to take the road that if you’re not interested in it – RGB lighting for example – you can just turn it off and forget about it. That’s true of the HS60 Haptic too, but because the sound quality is identical to the HS50 then you’re paying extra for a feature you might not use, in which case just get the HS50.

Sometimes a product can surprise you and change your preconceptions. With the Corsair HS60 Haptic we think that’s not really the case. When you read about it you already knew if you were interested, and if you were then it’s good enough at it’s task that you’ll be pleased with your purchase and thus it wins our Gamers Choice Award. It’s preaching to the converted. If, however, you felt it was a needless gimmick, then nothing it does will change your mind. It does exactly what you expect a vibrating headset to do, with exactly the quality we have come to expect from all of Corsair’s excellent products.

  

Discuss the Corsair HS60 Haptic Headset in our OC3D Forums.