The Roccat Kave isn't as feature-loaded as some of the recent headsets I've reviewed: its not wireless, it doesn't come with profile configuration software, and it doesn't have pulsating red lights. I think of it as the meat-and-potatoes of surround-sound gaming headsets: potent sound and a relatively modest $120 price tag. However, I'd happily have paid a little more for a version with a microphone that wasn't terrible.

Audio

This quality was immediately noticeable while playing Battlefield.
The Kave handles surround sound through four physical 40mm speakers, two in each earcup, which create some great directional sound. This quality was immediately noticeable while playing Battlefield 3 -- the audio came through crisp and clear as chaos surrounded me on all sides. Additionally, there are 30mm vibration drivers in each earcup that handle the bass response, helping to give some extra thump in lows.

From this angle, the desktop remote kind of looks like a DJ's turntable.

There's a small four-inch by two-inch remote on the cord that connects the headphones to the PC, letting you individually adjust each of the surround-sound settings center, front, rear, and subwoofer. I really didn't find that I needed to use those that often, and preferred to keep everything on the level. There's also a toggle on the remote to select between movie and game modes, but between listening to Ryan Gosling rev his engine in Drive in movie mode and coming under enemy fire in game mode, I really couldn't notice a difference between the two -- they both sounded equally good to me.

Hardware

The 11-foot cord seems like the perfect length.
As long as you have a 5.1 surround-sound card with the requisite amount of inputs and a free USB port, just plug everything in and you're good to go. The 11-foot cord seems like the perfect length to me -- 6.5 feet from the back of the PC to the remote, 4.5 feet from the remote to the headset. It's not short enough to make me search for an extension cable, and not long enough you're constantly rolling over it.

The Rocatt Kave is a very photogenic headset.

There's a real sore spot for the Kave, however: that microphone. It's a huge design gaffe to make the microphone plug into the outside of the left earcup without the means to keep it in place. When I moved it up and down too many times it became loose, and started falling right out so it requires some tightening every so often to stay in place. The audio quality of the microphone is also less than stellar -- it took a lot of tweaking in Windows' sound settings to get it loud enough that my voice could be heard in combat, and even then the audio quality was really rough.

Other than that, it's hard to find much more to complain about with the Kave. It's super comfortable, thanks to a large amount of padding and generous size. The large cups fit nicely around my ears, rather than pinning them to my head. When not in use, it can be folded up to cut down on the size a bit. Even the build quality felt good, not nearly as fragile-feeling as the more expensive Tactic 3D Omegas. It's not nearly as feature-rich as many other surround-sound headsets, but for its price, sound quality, and comfort it's hard to find better on the market.

Update: Roccat mailed us a second Roccat Kave headset to test the microphone in case the original unit we reviewed was defective. I found that the removable microphone does, in fact, stay in place, but frequently require some tightening after being moved.


Score



Pros: Good surround sound; really comfortable; great price.
Cons: Microphone is quiet; didn't notice a difference between the game and movie profiles.


Spy Guy says: As a professional spy, microphone quality matters a lot to me -- my survival can depend on the ability to hear an enemy agent fart from three hundred meters away. But what about you? Is a weak microphone a deal-breaker, or a small price to pay for cheap surround sound?