Microphone Performance

The Sharkoon Skiller SGH50 gaming headset's microphone was tested by connecting it to the Creative Sound BlasterX G6 sound card and a sound card integrated on the motherboard. The motherboard in question was the ASUS MAXIMUS XI Formula equipped with the SupremeFX S1220 audio codec. To review the microphone's sound and compare it to similar headsets, I used the Adam A7X speakers and Shure SRH840 headphones, which fall into the studio monitor category. I connected them to the Audiolab M-DAC, a high-quality digital-to-analog converter that functions as an external sound card when connected to a PC. I did the testing in Discord, Skype, and Audacity, and I also used Audacity to record the sound from the microphone. The sound was recorded with microphone sensitivity set to 100% and not post-processed or edited in any way.

For reference, I recorded this sample with the Rode NT-USB, a high-quality studio microphone:



This is an audio clip recorded by using the detachable omnidirectional microphone of the Sharkoon Skiller SGH50 gaming headset:




The microphone quality is one of the more obvious strong suits of the Sharkoon Skiller SGH50. This has to be one of the best microphones I have heard in the sub-$100 price bracket. It excels in depth and clarity and doesn't show any hints of compression. My voice sounds very natural, which isn't something I'm used to saying when describing a microphone on a headset of this price. The supplied pop filter audibly helps with plosives (along with the omnidirectional polar pattern). Even though my room wasn't dead silent while recording the samples, no noticeable background noise is present. Below, I'm providing the microphone samples of various other heavy hitters in the analog gaming headset department, just so you can directly compare them to the Sharkoon Skiller SGH50 and get a better idea of the quality of its microphone.