Hardware Review – Sharkoon X-Tatic SP
Looking for a pair of gaming headphones? The headphone market has been saturated heavily the past few years with tons of gaming headsets trying to find their way into consumer homes. Sharkoon, a German company that has been quietly delivering quality products over the past couple years, has added the Sharkoon X-Tatic SP headset to its repertoire. Does this new gaming headset stand out from the pack, or should it be left in the dust?
The Sharkoon X-Tatic SP is a headset made for gamers that works for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC. One of the first noticeable qualities about the headset is how fancy they look. The headset sports a sleek design with solid black plastic, a foam headband with the X-Tatic SP logo on top, and a generously long cable to feed to your gaming center. Some noteworthy design features include headphone swivel to ensure that the headset fits snug on your ears, a master volume control with mute switch, as well as a flexible and detachable microphone.
The detachable microphone is arguably one of the most outstanding features of the headset, and removing it is as simple as turning the microphone counter-clockwise to pull it out, and the opposite to put it back in. In several tests I found that the microphone quality performed well beyond expectations, and so well in-fact that some people that have heard me speak over Skype and Ventrilo have said that it sounds like I’m in a sound studio. In addition to the flexible design of the microphone, this is easily one of the best microphones I have ever seen on a headset.
Setting up the headphones on your PS3 is as easy as plugging them into the L/R audio ports on your TV, and the USB cable into an available USB port on your PS3. From there, once your options on the PS3 are configured to allow for audio port output, you’re ready for the world of German-engineered Sharkoon. These headphones also work extremely well in any PC setup, and you’ll only need to plug them into the audio out and USB ports to experience them in that environment. I found setup to be painless, and the cord length ensures that you’ll be able to play in your living room no matter how far away you sit.
As the $69.99 price would suggest, the audio output here is solid. The bass is a bit soft but very clean, and with a frequency response of 20 Hz – 20 kHz, both the highs and lows can be heard cleanly. The audio quality is so good in-fact, that you’ll likely want to use these for music and video applications in addition to gaming. However, these are open headphones so some sound does leak which means a loss of quality. The good side of this is that you’ll still be able to hear outside of your headphones, so you won’t feel like you’re forced into an alternate dimension every time you throw them on your head.
The Sharkoon X-Tatic SP headphones are incredibly comfortable with the shape and headband foam fitting soft and snug around the head. While I would have preferred softer material around the cups of the headphones themselves, the material included is fine, and unlike many other headphones with leather-like materials, these won’t make you sweat around the ears. Since the microphone is both removable and adjustable, you won’t have trouble with it getting in your way.
The only gripe I have with the audio experience provided by the Sharkoon X-Tatic SP is the neverending background noise. Whether plugged into my PlayStation 3 or PC, there is a soft, ocean-like tone that never seems to stop. While the noise is overridden the second you start hearing music or game noises, it’s annoying to wear the headphones between experiences because of this.
The Sharkoon X-Tatic SP headset is one of the best gaming headsets under $100 on the market. With phenomenal audio and microphone quality, you’ll likely be drawn to use these over your current routine speaker and mic setup. Setup is simple and the overall design is both comfortable and stylish. Although the background noise and hard foam are detracting factors, the overall product is far too satisfying to do anything other than recommend these. If you’re looking for a gaming headset for either your PlayStation 3 or PC, the Sharkoon X-Tatic SP is well worth your hard earned money.
PlayStation LifeStyle’s Final Score
+ Outstanding adjustable microphone and superb audio experience. - Dead air background noise is annoying. |  |
9 Responses to “Hardware Review – Sharkoon X-Tatic SP”
Cool, I should put this on my wish list. I seem to go through head sets like tissues. My current one has the rubber piece that goes in your ear all screwed up, so my ear hurts after wearing it for about a half hour. Playing BFBC2 just isn’t the same without communication!
good review. so do you have the option of a 3.5mm headphone jack or just the l\r audio plugs?
Well, for PC you use just the 3.5mm jack but I’ll have to test to see if that works with the PS3 as well. My instinct tells me no.
I suspect they are like my Logitech G330′s that have a USB adapter inline to work with PS3/X-box 360 and then use the 3.5mm plugs for mike and headphones on the PC. They work great and I bet with the German Engineering on these I would be tempted to spend the money.
cool. i was just wondering because ive actually been looking for a good set of headphones for music to listen to at home. since these can be used on the ps3 as well is a big plus. i never really considered using headphones for gaming and was just gonna go for bose or something, but i just might look into these. thanks!
this are like the AX180, just a little modified on the exterior (i think)
Sharkon also has a carbon copy of the AX Pro, and i saw an unboxing video of the X-Tatic and looked so similar to my AX180 in terms of packaging and the removable mic is a give away.
Wonder if there is any difference performance wise (doubt it)
I purchased these headphones after reading this review, and I must say that I’m very impressed. The sound quality is great, the microphone quality is great, but what impressed me most was the length of the cord. The cord on this thing is like 20 meters long. I took these headphones in to the woods behind my house and used the cord to create snare traps to catch mouth watering rabbits. That’s not even the best part, these headphones can do all kinds of things. Spider on your roof? You can throw these things at it from the other side of your house and pull them back to you ready to throw again, thus allowing you to defeat the spider without having to go near it. You can’t do that with other headphones because the cord isn’t long enough. Less interesting is the time I used them to lasso a bull that was about to kill my brother. Anyway, point is, these headphones can do a lot of things and I’m very impressed. 10/10 hardware, definitely.
101/10 comment without question! You’ve convinced me to buy these headphones good sir.
OMG- All I have to say. I just got my product today and I am throwing away my old Turtle….These headsets rock- they fit perfectly on my head….they sound like surround , I can hear stuff with this headset that I never heard before and not to mention that they look awesome. I can tell that these headsets are high quality engeneered and built to last…. I would say they are like Bose headsets for gamers. I give them a 10 too…..grab one before they go, I see that BesBuy is sold out on them but you should be able to find them elsewhere.