Sennheiser PC160 Headset

Manufacturer: Sennheiser

Price: $99.99

If you've read the section on the PC150 you'll be aware that we weren't all that impressed with it - indeed, it's probably the lamest duck of all the headsets featured here. Sennheiser can breathe a little easier with this one though as it's superior to the PC150, though once again we'd have doubts as to the cost - features ratio on the 160.

The usual sleek Sennheiser design is present and correct and the headset is almost physically identical to that of the PC150 except for larger earpieces, which encapsulate the ear rather than sit on top of it in the slightly funny manner of the PC150. As such it's slightly more comfortable, which helps over long hauls of wearing the headset.

The cable is a good 10 feet long, which was too much for us trendy folk with our handy frontal jacks and meant we had to be careful to not roll over and damage the wire in our swivel chairs - an annoyance, but one which you're bound to encounter with most headphones when plugging into the front of your computer or the side of your laptop.

The microphone suffers from the same design flaws as the PC150, being nonadjustable and poorly positioned. You may have to fluke around with the settings on the software side to get the thing to transmit at audible volumes, which is a blow for such a purportedly high-end headset that should really come ready-to-go. When it does transmit, the mic puts across fairly nice sound, but the fact that one has to mess around to get it is inconsolable.