Asus ROG Delta S

Great game audio is let down by a simple design flaw.

$TBC

Irog. asus.com t’s two big firsts for Asus this issue, with their first Asus-switch-powered keyboard on the previous page, and now the new Delta S gaming cans, which include a whole mess of audio buzzwords. Built-in quad DAC! MQA rendering! Switch and PlayStation compatibility! It’s all very exciting, but the other thing Asus is touting - a lightweight 300gm design - is where things go just a little bit sideways…

Which is a serious shame, because the Delta S headset sounds fantastic. Annoyingly, for best performance, you do need to download and install the ROG Armoury Crate software, so if you’re not a fan of Asus’ coding smarts, you might be wary. But once installed, you start to discover a truly formidable array of options. From here you can set whether you’ll hear audio in stereo or in virtual surround, choose reverb settings (if you’re some kind of monster), and fiddle with equaliser presets, amongst other things. To be honest, it’s far from the worst software we’ve seen, at least in terms of audio tweaking (we’re looking at you, JBL!).

Of course, not all those presets are all that useful, and if you’re like us, you’ll be sticking with the Gaming preset, and virtual surround on. There’s a dedicated FPS preset, but that just boosts everything to such an over the top level that it’s downright distracting. Of course, your own mileage may vary, but with those settings we were legitimately blown away – even plain old stereo sounds amazing. I’ve just started getting into Warframe (don’t judge) and in the missions where you’re defending a location against waves of enemies that appear from all around the map, I was able to pinpoint each approach by sound alone.

Music is another area where the Delta S headset shines, and if you’re a user of hi-res services like Tidal, MQA rendering will make those streams sound even better. Normal playback and streaming is solid, but not as detailed as in-game audio, but that’s just a quibble, and for ordinary listeners they’re perfectly fine.

Design-wise… Yeah. The Delta

S cans are light – super light. Almost too light, in fact. I have a rather sizeable noggin, and the combination of lightweight design and lack of clamp force meant that the headset sat very lightly on my head indeed. Tested by someone with a more reasonable skull, the Delta S became downright wobbly; the earcups sat askew, making the soundscape sound muddied. We commend lightweight headphones, and the detachable mic works great, but they just don’t sit firmly, and can be shaken off far too easily. There’s a second pair of earpads in the kit, so that’s nice, and a USB converter if you can’t handle the native USB C connector, but that lack of clamp force is a real downer. It’s the only thing keeping ROG’s latest from becoming our new favourite set of gaming cans.

DAVID HOLLINGWORTH

A stellar audio outing, with incredible clarity in-game, and perfect for gamers also into hi-res music streaming. But a too-light design gets in the way of making for a near-perfect headset. Buty Asus is on the right track.

VERDICT 81