Audeze’s Maxwell 2 Upgrades Our Favourite High-End Wireless Gaming Headset

The Audeze Maxwell ranks arsenic 1 of the champion gaming headsets connected the market, and present its successor has arrived amongst the CES chaos. The Maxwell 2 replaces the archetypal mentation and comes successful astatine a somewhat higher price, but offers a laundry database of upgrades including audio quality, comfort, mic prime and bass response.

The large betterment present is the inclusion of Audeze's SLAM technology, which the institution says 'produces heightened spatial immersion and precision on with punchier bass response'. That's achieved done pairing the firm's 90mm planar magnetic drivers with patented magnets and waveguides, 'delivering an expansive 10Hz to 50kHz frequence range'. The aforesaid tech is utilized successful Audeze's S20 and CBRN2 headphones, wherever it has attracted mostly affirmative reviews, truthful it could beryllium a bully acoustic upgrade for the Maxwell too.

The Maxwell 2 besides sports an AI noise-cancelling microphone with doubly the bandwidth of its predecessor, a inclination we've seen connected a scope of gaming headsets released implicit the past twelvemonth oregon so, which is intended to connection clearer connection portion gaming.

I anticipation you've been gathering your cervix muscles - a 560g headset is nary joke.

The Maxwell 2 (and the archetypal Maxwell) besides benefits from the merchandise of a caller Audeze mobile app, simply called 'Audeze', which lets you customise assorted aspects of the headset. This is simply a cardinal diagnostic for the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Elite and different caller SteelSeries headsets, arsenic it allows you to acceptable customized EQs for console games, truthful it'll beryllium absorbing to spot whether the Audeze app is arsenic almighty connected this front. The redesigned app is besides disposable connected Windows and Mac.

The 1 noticeable downside to the archetypal Maxwell we noted successful our reappraisal was its dense weight, astatine 490 grams. Unfortunately, this caller exemplary is adjacent heavier, astatine 560 grams. That's beauteous substantial, though the archetypal exemplary was good balanced capable to not beryllium excessively bothersome, adjacent for agelong gaming sessions. Despite cultivating much mass, the headset does see a redesigned caput strap, which hopefully volition bash the trick, and the Maxwell 2 besides retains a hefty artillery beingness fig of 80 hours.

The Maxwell 2 is successful banal astatine assorted retailers present and costs $329 for the PlayStation mentation oregon $349 for the Xbox model. That's up somewhat from the archetypal Maxwell, which was $299 for the PlayStation exemplary and $329 for the Xbox version. In the UK, prices are £339 for the basal exemplary and £369 for added Xbox support. A pricier mentation with ANC enactment is besides expected to beryllium released aboriginal this spring.

Will is lawman tech exertion for IGN, specialising successful PC hardware, sim racing and show tech. He has been publishing astir games and exertion since 2001 (age 12). Will was formerly Deputy Editor astatine Digital Foundry. He is presently playing Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.