Software

The Corsair HS80 MAX is controlled through the iCUE software driver. The latest redesign of iCUE made it even more powerful and somewhat easier to use, although the sheer number of options still makes it one of the more challenging peripheral software drivers.


On the Home screen, you'll see two items related to the HS80 MAX gaming headset: the headset itself, and the wireless receiver. If you click on the receiver, you'll be able to update its firmware and initiate pairing.


After clicking on the headset, first you'll end up in the Key Assignments menu, where you can assign a device-related or a system setting to the button on the volume wheel. Custom macros are also supported, so you can basically give it any functionality you can think of, which some will find very useful. I ended up using it for EQ profiles, namely to switch between the Pure Direct and FPS Competition profile, depending on the game I was playing. Interestingly, Corsair also offers a paid Voicemod integration, which is essentially an AI voice changer, if that's something you're into (and so much that you're willing to pay for it).


In the Lighting Effects section of the HS80 RGB Wireless settings, there are four factory lighting profiles to choose from: Rainbow, Color Pulse, Color Shift, and Watercolor Spectrum. A few custom profiles (Static Color, Solid, Gradient) are also available, as well as various Lighting Link profiles, which can be used to synchronize the RGB effects between Corsair's gaming peripherals. To turn the RGB effects off, you have to visit the Device Settings menu and reduce the brightness of the LEDs all the way down. There used to be a "No Effect" option available in the Lighting Effects menu, which was a more logical way to turn the RGB lightning system off.


The NVIDIA menu offers NVIDIA Broadcast integration. It's an AI-powered noise and room echo filtering technology, which is applied to outgoing audio. It can only be used if your system is equipped with an NVIDIA RTX-series graphics card.


The Equalizer menu is where you'll find the microphone controls (gain and sidetone), different system-wide EQ presets, and the option to create your own. The equalizer is a 10-band one, with a ±12 dB scale, and the option to link the neighboring sliders, to make the adjusted frequency response smoother.


The SoundID Personalization menu is where you can create and toggle a personalized sound profile. More on that in the sound quality section of the review.


The Device Settings menu opens up a window where you can look for firmware updates, adjust the auto-shutoff feature of the headset, disable the microphone LED when the mic is active, turn the voice prompts on and off, boost the microphone, control the brightness of the RGB lighting system (why isn't this in the Lighting Effects menu is beyond me), check the battery status, and initiate the USB wireless receiver pairing.