The Level10M Headset -
The Level10M Headset follows the same design philosophy that the Level10 case and Level10M mice do. You can easily see this when you look at it. The lines, aluminum construction, even the paint makes this headset stand out from the rest leaving you no doubt who made it.

Starting off at the ear pieces we find an open design using 40mm neodymium magnet drivers. In the world of audio this means that the drivers are open to the surrounding air either with no backing or with a smaller port to allow for normal air pressure. In headphones using a port is not efficient so it is more likely that the drivers we open in the back, but with some sort of sound dampening material to cancel outside noise and reduce leakage of the audio you hear.

The frequency response for these drivers is 10Hz to 22KHz which is not bad at all of for most headphones, but what you should demand in a high-end gaming headset.

Looking at the ear cups we do note one thing that concerns us, that is the depth. If this is too shallow then it might not fit onto every head the same way. This leads to gaps around the ears and sound leakage from external and internal sources. You will get a wash effect where noises from outside can cancel out or interfere with the audio coming from the drivers. We will be checking that in our performance section.

Once very cool feature that we do want to talk about on the ear pieces is the ability to plug in on wither earpiece. With most headsets (even high-end ones) you get one option for connectivity. This means the cable has to run down one side and one side only. Thermaltake decided to give you the option to use either side by putting a mini USB connector on both ear pieces.

Moving up to the crossbar we find a nice mount and also a great idea, you can actually lock the Level10M headset into place once you find the right fit. This is not a common option and considering the ease of adjustment found on this headset was a very good idea to include. Due to the way the mount is setup here Thermaltake decided to run the wires from the earpiece drivers externally. This puts them at risk of getting caught on something and damaged. Although this might be an unlikely occurrence it is something to look out for.

Looking at the top of the crossbar we find a nice pad. Give the weight of the Level10M this should make for a comfortable fit.

Moving all the way around we come to the microphone. This is an omni-directional noise canceling mic that rotates on an axis. When not in use it rotates up and out of the way when down it does not come all the way in front of the mouth, but extends enough that you should not have any issues with people hearing you. This design also has the benefit of naturally removing the pops you get with hard consonants by moving the mic out of the way.

Overall it is a nice clean design with some style behind it. As it stand if there are no issues with the depth of the ear cups we expect performance to be solid. Let’s check that out now.