The software today mimics the same suite in my recent review of MSI's high-end gaming keyboard and mouse combo, which you can find here. The gaming center acts more as a control suite for MSI's mice, keyboards, and other devices. MSI Mystic Light controls... well, just that. The RGB lighting found on all of MSI's high-end gaming peripherals. Naturally, last time I said that I would like to see this go down to a single piece of software, if possible, and this hasn't changed. It would be a very welcome bonus.
Gaming Centre
Nothing thus far has changed in terms of Gaming Centre's UI, so if you want a brief rundown of that, please check out the review above. However, as a quick and dirty intro, the word 'functional' is a term that comes to mind. You are presented with three areas in which you can further customize the product in question [conveniently, this goes for any attached headset, mouse, and keyboard]. There is a basic 'LED On/Off' with each product, and further functionality is provided by means of various tabs or panels. Going into the options for each, we find a fairly extensive amount of configuration for each peripheral.
.jpg]
.jpg]
.jpg]
.jpg]
.jpg]
.jpg]
.jpg]
MSI Gaming Centre allows the user to customize the headset's audio, microphone, and lighting. The audio tab allows for the usual EQ tweaking [as well as several presets], with the addition of Xears effects. Headphone sample rate can also be adjusted for more granular control. The microphone tab is fairly basic but works well enough. The lighting tab can be used alongside MSI Mystic Light, but independently provides a fairly wide array of options. Whilst it's an unchanged UI from my previous reviews where this software suite is concerned, it works to an extent where I am happy. The EQ control is particularly good, allowing for fairly fine control, and although there are not that many presets, it should be fine for most people out there. Overall, the Gaming Centre is functional and works. To be fair, I guess that is all that can really be asked, though - as I said before - it would be good to see MSI re-work the UI and make it a little cleaner or less cluttered. That being said, there is nothing inherently wrong with it, and me being entirely fair would prefer the product 'working' first, then user friendliness taking second place.
Mystic Light
MSI Mystic Light worked a whole lot better for the headset than it ever did for the mouse and keyboard I looked at some weeks back. The UI is, again, simple [and in my opinion a little 'too much' for what functionality there actually is], but it does the job well and I was able to change color modes/zones with ease. The photos you see here are with the headset in its wave mode, cycling between all available colors at a speed/direction pre-determined by the user.
.jpg]
Ultimately, little has changed from a few weeks ago. The software works just fine, but MSI really needs to combine these two suites into a single and cohesive unit. I'd hope this can be done because I can see the potential here for a very nice/clean app with good functionality and ease of use. It did work better with the headset [Mystic Light], though I am not sure how much of that I can attribute to the suite only having to deal with a single device, because part of my confusion with Mystic Light in my prior review was just that, i.e. how to reliably sync/control both at the same time.
Testing will be conducted by connecting the MSI Immerse GH70 gaming headset to the test computer system as listed below.
Ryzen Computer System Components:
- Processor: AMD Ryzen 1800X
- Motherboard: MSI X370 XPower Gaming Titanium
- Cooler: MSI Core Frozr XL
- Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16 GB [2x8] DDR4
- Video: Nvidia GTX 1080 8GB Founders Edition
- Disk Drive: ADATA SX900 250GB SSD
- Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower DPS G 850W
- OS: Windows 10 Pro 64bit
Comfort: I felt the GH70 was initially a tight fit due to the high tensile strength of the stainless steel head bands, but it was easy enough to fix with a few adjustments of the headset placement for the two headbands [with the padded band being slightly off axis to the upper steel bands]. This allowed me to appreciate how comfortable the deep well of the ear cups felt.
Conversations: After installing all of the software for the GH70, I accessed the "Sound" control panel, where I was able to test the 7.1 Surround Sound capabilities of the 50 mm Neodymium driver units.
I next choose the "Recording" tab to test the GH70 headset's microphone. Here is where I found that even with the microphone completely recessed into the headphone, I could still see the voice meter move but the sounds were determined to be unintelligible. Once I correctly extracted and positioned the microphone, I was able to perform a sound pickup test as seen in the right image below.
Skype - I performed the Echo / Sound Test Service where you listen to the service message to speak any short phrase at the beep. Then the phrase plays back to verify that your microphone works and speech pattern is discernable. Having just completed the Control Panel ‘Sound’ sub-routine test I knew I would pass this test, but it didn't hurt to confirm that the GH70 was properly set up.
Even though it was just across town, the Skype session I initiated went well and also confirmed how the GH70 headset ear phones could reproduce the other party’s voice with clarity. I also received a thumbs up from the other party with regards to the quality of the audio picked up by the headest's microphone.
Music: The speaker sound options in the MSI Gaming Center software offer an equalizer that you can adjust as desired, or you can simply stick with one of the preset choices. I could then use the speaker "Xears Effects" to set the surround sound to use "Music Mode" or "Movie Mode"; or I could select the rough size of the sound stage.
Even though the GH70 headset only uses a 50 mm Neodymium driver unit in each headphone, you can use the MSI Gaming Center software to change the sample rate and bit depth to allow the speakers to reproduce sounds with greater clarity and vibrancy.