2024-01-20 11:07:18
Alienware peripherals, known for their futuristic designs and premium build quality, don’t tend to trouble the settings of professional gamers, but instead appeal to casual gamers who want a bit of luxury and a bold look.
Enter the $179 AW920H headphones — packed to the brim with features and futuristic, and priced accordingly, but still haven’t nailed down an elegant way to make everything work together seamlessly.
The headliner is its ‘tri-mode’ combo, which offers active noise cancellation, Bluetooth and 2.4GHz wireless connectivity. On top of that, there’s also touch controls, an optional 3.5mm jack and Dolby Atmos support. These are also generally well-implemented, and packaged in generally excellent build materials.
But stay with me, dear reader, as I’ll tell you how a few minor glitches keep otherwise brilliant headphones from hitting the runway.
Alienware AW920H: design and comfort
If you can count on Alienware for one thing, it’s bold design. It’s not easy to make functional objects like headphones look like the stuff of science fiction, but the unique shape of the AW920H makes you imagine flying saucers with jet engines running at the bottom. It’s as cheesy as you’d expect from a brand whose logo is a foreign head, but a fun, hearty kind of cheesy.
Everything is also finished to a very high standard. The matte finish on my Lunar Light sample is incredibly even and pleasant to the touch, with the RGB Alienware logos looking sharp on each ear cup.
The fabric that runs around the ear cup cushions and the inner headband also feel really high quality. It might get a little sweaty in warmer conditions, but it’s really comfortable and you need it to create a decent seal for that ANC to work effectively. There are no creaks around any of the adjustment points – despite the mostly plastic construction, it feels sturdy and fits the price tag.
However, the ear cups are on the small side, which can affect comfort levels as larger ears can poke out past the inside of the cushioned pads. And since there’s quite a lot of clamping force on these headphones, you don’t want your ear pressed against the cushion for long periods.
I found a fit that works for me, even with slightly larger ears, and found that while it feels quite heavy and firm when you put it on, the AW920H doesn’t dig in for long and stays where you put it.
Alienware AW920H: Features and Controls
There is a lot to go through here. The top billing must come with ANC implementation, which is rare to see on gaming headsets at all, let alone sub-$200. Noise cancellation affects the natural sound you hear from the source, so not everyone likes it. The implementation here is subtle and fairly neutral in tone, similar to Bose’s QC45s, but slightly less effective at reducing ambient lows.
There is a choice between three types of connections here, which include wireless 2.4GHz, Bluetooth 5.2 and 3.5 mm reliable and good wireless. There is even a choice of dongles to connect to them – USB or USB-C. Personally, I really appreciate this option. There is always a lack I have USB slots so it’s nice that Alienware thought of that and spent the extra manufacturing cost on a choice of two.
However, wireless and Bluetooth connectivity do not work at the same time. This means you can’t mix sources, like receiving calls from your smartphone while you’re playing or using a Discord chat from another device. That’s a real shame, because we’ve seen Steelseries’ Arctis headsets pull off this feat for years and the EPOS, Corsair, and Logitech G followed suit. At least you can use it on your smartphone after turning off the computer.
There are a surprising number of hidden physical controls in such a sleek and minimal headset. In the right ear cup you have the power button, with a light indicator – green for fuel, yellow for charging.
On the left side there is a toggle switch between wireless and Bluetooth connections, a microphone mute button and an ANC switch. These three are placed quite close together and the mute button is a tiny hinge so it takes a while for your muscle memory to locate it properly when you reach for it. After a week I’m pretty much nailed, but it feels like an avoidable design issue.
There are also a number of touch controls that handle volume, media playback, lighting and ANC. Amazingly there’s no microphone mute gesture, but swipes and taps are recorded accurately enough to make this a practical way to turn up or down the volume mid-game.
The microphone is removable – very useful if you want to use these cans with your smartphone in public, and it connects via the 3.5mm input jack. However, since there’s only one of these inputs, you have to choose between connecting a microphone or connecting your headphones to your PC .
In real terms, it’s unlikely that anyone buying wireless headphones will find it a huge inconvenience. But it leaves the impression that there are some design wrinkles here that have not yet been ironed out.
Alienware AW920H: Sound quality
There is a lot to unpack about the sound quality. First of all there’s ANC, which is effective and doesn’t color the audio too noticeably, but does introduce a noticeable ‘frizz’ when turned on, as many ANC headphones do at quiet settings.
Next up is Dolby Atmos support, which is a very subjective use case. I usually turn off any virtual surround sound as soon as I start using the headphones, because I don’t like the artificial ringing and echo it seems to add. But in this case, even as a surround Luddite, I have to admit that Atmos works well.
3D sound spaces are nice and wide, and pleasant audio cues are played with impressive precision. I’ll still stick with a standard stereo pad for games like PUBG where detecting audio cues is really important. But for movies and immersive solo gaming where I’m not trying to perform at eSports level, Atmos is, well, actually pretty fun.
About the basic sound quality of those 40mm drivers. They’re powerful, they interact well with ANC and Atmos, and they’re sensibly tuned so as not to overdo the low end, with a nice flat EQ curve. In a perfect world they’d sound a little More advanced frequencies, but no complaints when it comes to the overall audio quality.
A quick mention of the microphone, which features some truly impressive AI noise cancellation. It can kill the mechanical keyboard, as far as I haven’t heard from a gaming mic before. However, the overall quality of your broadcast voice is just fine. not to stand out. The artificial intelligence is good at cutting noise, but it is not used to enrich the signal.
Alienware AW920H: Battery life and charging
The claimed battery life on a full charge is 55 hours via Bluetooth, or 30 hours via wireless. However, this is when you turn off the RGB lighting. In the real world, with RGB on and volume occasionally creeping above 50%, I get about 20-25 hours right now.
It’s more than enough actually, and since you can keep using the AW920H while it’s charging via USB-C, I never found myself bothered by the battery. Charging it to a full battery takes between two and three hours.
Alienware AW920H: Verdict
The Alienware AW920H has a lot going for it forward-looking, and most of it works effortlessly and comfortably.
The ANC is especially welcome at this price point, the aesthetics are generally strong, and I’m surprised to say that Dolby Atmos sounds great through its 40mm driver. You’ll also appreciate the AI-powered noise cancellation on the microphone.
But there are just a few too many small problems to avoid with this model to reach the top ranks. Having to share a 3.5mm input for connecting the microphone or wired headphones, the inability to use wireless and Bluetooth at the same time and a hard-to-find mute switch all add up. It feels one iteration away from amazing headphones, in short.
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