Genius HS-04U Game, USB virtual Dolby headset. Virtual Dolby headphone function brings real 3D sound experience.

t’s been a long, long time coming, but at last it would appear that integrated in-game voice chat is finally becoming an ubiquitous feature for PC games. While the PC may have started the trend long before the consoles with independent apps like Roger Wilco, Xbox Live has made clear the benefits of ubiquitous support. On the back of Microsoft’s Games For Windows / Live push, and supported by Blizzard’s plans for a voice chat addition to WoW, more and more major PC releases are giving players integrated tools with which to have real conversations.

Coinciding with this movement is the release of a wide variety of new PC-gaming headsets. Last week, Bozon put his Counter Strike skills to use and reviewed the widely popular Medusa 5.1 ProGamer V2 headset (review). He pronounced it excellent, but that’s what we’d hope to see from a $120 device. Realistically, not everyone wants to spend quite that much on a headset, and as such Genius recently premiered the $50 HS-04U USB headset. Let’s see if it measures up.

 Aesthetically the HS-04U is designed to appeal to gamers, sporting a shiny metallic grey paintjob and oversized, spoked ear cups. It’s pretty lightweight and feels comfortable in use. The open-air ear cups are nice and prevent gross sweaty ears at intense LAN parties. The mic-boom is impressively pliable, yet holds a shape without problems, and the USB wire is about ten-feet long. The in-line volume / mute dongle is about 18-inches removed from the actual earphones, which positions it in the user’s lap when the headphones are worn. The volume + and – buttons are surrounded by illuminated circles that glow green when on and red when muted. Overall the HS-04Us are comfortable and decently attractive.

The HS-04Us are USB, which means they will bypass whatever sound card you’ve got, for good or ill. Fortunately, the HS-04Us can do a bit of processing of their own and support Dolby Headphone, an algorithm that simulates 5.1 surround on two-channel stereo headsets. It makes a difference, most blatantly evidenced via demos built into the HS-04U’s driver software that allow users to change the size of their virtual listening room, apply reverb to simulate large concert spaces, and test simulated positional audio. Especially in the case of the virtualized 3D sound space demo, we were impressed with what the $50 headphones could accomplish.

 Unfortunately, these features are only available to Windows XP and earlier users. Though Genius cites the HS-04U as Vista compatible, the bundled drivers that enable the Dolby Headphone effects won’t work with Vista, which means the HS-04Us default to their most basic functionality without Dolby Headphone support. Worse still, in our testing on two Vista machines, only one of two actually recognized it as a functional headset; the other rejected it completely in the plug and play process. Genius doesn’t offer driver downloads via its website, so possible resolutions for these Vista problems are unknown.

When functional in Windows XP, however, the HS-04Us provide quality sound for their price point. Because of the open air ear-cups bass lacks a bit of punch, but it’s still better than what you’ll find among lower tier headsets in the $30 range. Though it’s true the Medusas we have on hand sound significantly better, they also cost twice as much. As such, the Genius HS-04Us stand as a solid, if not terribly remarkable, mid-tier gaming headset.