I know, RGB LEDs on a headphone sounds somewhat gimmicky, but that doesn’t stop brands from bringing up their own flavors to the plate. And today, we have one flavor from our friends over at Tt eSPORTS called Cronos Riing RGB 7.1.

The Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 is the latest addition to the Tt eSports Cronos lineup. It features a similar design as that of their previous headsets from the Cronos line, but lots of changes have been made to give it a new name. The Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 comes with features like 50mm neodymium drivers, Virtual 7.1 surround sound, and of course, RGB LEDs, and more. So, let’s start the review with the unboxing and the manufacturer’s take on the product.

Tt eSPORTS’ take on Cronos Riing RGB:

The CRONOS Riing RGB 7.1 comes packed with features and latest tech offering up an oversized 50mm state-of-the-art tilting neodymium driver and true RGB engineered with 16.8 million color illumination amongst 8 different lighting effects gives you unparalleled customization options to personalize your own battle colors. It also comes equipped with the latest 7.1 premium virtual surround sound technology to offer the most immersive 3D sound experience to ensure you hear all sounds with pinpoint accuracy for that all-important competitive edge.

Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 Unboxing:

Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 Closer Look:

So this is what the Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 Looks like outside of the box. What immediately catches the eyes are the auto-adjustable headband and the glossy finish of the earcups.

As shown in the video, we have the direction indicator on both side of the headphone so you know which way to wear the headphone. Which of course can be understood by looking at the direction the microphone comes out.

The Cronos Riing features a retractable boom mic. Here’s a comparison of how far out the microphone comes out.

Here’s a close-up shot of the microphone boom. The red ring that you see near the end actually holds a Red LED inside. So, when you plug in the headphone, the ring actually glows in Red. And yes, the microphone is flexible so you can adjust its position.

From this view, you can see the ear cushions on this headphone are really thick, at 25mm height. The Cronos Riing RGB is a closed back on-ear headphone, hence the diameter doesn’t seem too big to hold your ears completely.

The headband also features padding, however, it’s in Red color to give the headphone that little extra aesthetic touch. And the padding on the headphone is much softer than on the earcups.

Then we have the Tt eSPORTS branding on the top of the headband.

This is how the earcups on this headphone look from the outside. You can also go back to the microphone length comparison pictures for a closer look at the earcups. The ring and the logo both features RGB LED controller by the software. And if you haven’t noticed so far, then the headphone also features rotatable earcups up to 90 degrees so you can hang it around your neck with the earcups folded.

And this is the Inline controller of the Cronos Riing RGB. We have the logo in middle, which also features RGB LED. Then we have a total of 4 buttons on the inline controller, two of which are for volume adjustment and the other two are for switching between audio channels and EQ profiles. However, these 4 buttons do not sport RGB LEDs.

On the left side, we have a microphone mute switch. And at the back of the switch, we have a clip so you can attach the inline controller to something like your T-shirt cuffs.

Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 Specification:

COLOR	DIAMOND BLACK
CONNECTOR	USB PLUG X1
DRIVER UNIT (MM)	50MM NEODYMIUM MAGNET
CABLE LENGTH	2.0 METERS
PLUG&PLAY MICROPHONE	YES
EXTERNAL IN-LINE CONTROLLER	YES
PART NUMBER	HT-CRA-DIECBK-20
CHANNEL	VIRTUAL 3D 7.1 SURROUND SOUND
FREQUENCY RESPONSE	20HZ-20KHZ
IMPEDANCE	32 Ω
SENSITIVITY	99 ±3 DB
MAX INPUT	100 MW

MIC DIRECTIVITY	OMNI-DIRECTIONAL
ACCESSORIES	WARRANTY CARD X 1 QUICK INSTALLATION GUIDE X 1
MIC SENSITIVITY	-42DB ± 3DB
MIC FREQUENCY	100HZ~10KHZ
MIC IMPEDANCE	< 2.2KΩ

Build and Comfort:

This is one of the aspects where I didn’t find the Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 very promising. There’s a lot of room for improvement when it comes to the overall design of the Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 headphone, at least for my head.

I like the auto-adjusting headband of the headphone, it’s really comfortable like you don’t even feel there’s something over your head. And also, because of the self-adjusting headband design, you don’t need to do adjust the height, just put it on and you should be good.

But that’s for the top part of the headset when it comes to the earcups, it’s a totally different story. The earcups feature an internal diameter of 50mm and a depth of 25mm. Now I wouldn’t go as far as saying I have large ears, no I don’t. But being an on-ear headphone, the diameter just doesn’t cut it. When I try to wear the headphone considering it as an over-ear headphone, upper and lower earlobes are pressed against the boundary or the earcups. Same is the case if I try to insert the upper and lower ear lobe inside the earcups. And when it comes to the wearing the headphone considering it as an on-ear, I have to wear it while having the rear-side of cushions on my ear while the front side is touching my cheeks. In that situation, the headphone losses its grip and if I tilt my head towards the ground, the headphone can easily fall off. The headphone weighs around 345 gram which shouldn’t feel too uncomfortable, however the pressure around the ears cancel’s that comfortability.

Now talking about the outside of the earcups which will be visible to the audience, it has a nice design. It features a gloss finish along with RGB LEDs which will surely attract some attention if you’re in a crowd or at LAN parties.

As for the build quality, the headphone uses plastic material for the body, with earcup and headband cushions/foam covered in fabric. The headphone does seem sturdy but leaves a lot to wish when it comes to comfortability.

Audio Quality:

Audio quality is something that’s subjective for the most part. You can test certain objective things, but in the end, it boils down to what the owner of the headphone feels about the audio produced by the drivers inside. Everyone has their own taste when it comes to audio, some prefer Bass-oriented headphone, while some like a well-balanced production. And also, the listening capability, which usually deteriorates along the age is also a big factor. So, before we begin this section, I would like to give a little profile on myself. I’m 22 years in age and prefer a headphone with good balance with the bass just a little bit over the normal when I’m listening to everyday stuff, while I like bass-oriented headphones when I listen to electronic music. And when it comes to gaming, I like to hear everything clearly, be that a flash grenade on the far end of the map or someone approaching me from behind.

Before we get into the subjective opinion, there’s a series of tests available on a website called Audiocheck.net which covers some of the basic objective features of the headphone. The tests also have a description of what they’re for. So, let’s have a look at the results of the tests:

Bass Extension:	10HZ-200Hz
Treble extension:	19KHz-8KHz
Dynamic Range:	54 dB below full scale
Driver Quality:	Passed
Driver Matching:	Passed
Wiring:	Passed
Binaural test:	Passed

Now let’s talk about the subjective opinion. I’ve used the headphone with a couple of games like CS: GO, BF1, GTA: V, Rocket League and others, and also with some movies and songs. And I found the audio quality of the headphone OK-ish on the default preset. The default preset on the headphone sounds a little flat and seems to underwhelm the 50mm neodymium driver’s true performance. This may be good for audio producers as they can hear the frequencies as natural as they come, but on the other end, this leaves the audio somewhat unfulfilled. So, with a little bit of tweaking with the equalizer and upping the lows a bit, I found the audio quality had improved a lot, at least to my preference. The sound becomes a lot more immersive with the right profile. I really enjoy using this headphone when it comes to gaming. And I’ve just started playing OSU a few days back, where you have to tap with your mouse within a specific area, on beats, on different song, and it’s a pleasure to play that game with this headphone.

And since you do get the equalizer with this headphone, you can tweak it to almost any sound profile you like. With a little bit of adjustment, I was very happy with the stereo audio quality of the headphone.

But when it comes to the 3D 7.1 virtual surround sound profile, it wasn’t very promising. But then again, this is virtual 7.1 surround sound that we’re talking about, being produced by only 2 drivers. With the Virtual surround sound, it felt like the audio sources were pushed back, and to be honest, I felt better with the stereo profile in games where 7.1 surround sound should have done wonders. The surround sound profile is something you’d expect from a low tier virtual 7.1 headphone. So, it’s better to keep it off.

Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 Software:

The Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 comes along with a software called, none other than the product’s name itself “Cronos Riing RGB 7.1”. The software is based on C-media’s Xear engine. It has a lot of options to play around with which doesn’t seem like the case at first glance.

On the top, we have the brand logo, then some setting identifiers that tell you which setting is enabled or disabled for the headphone right now. You also have a master volume controller. On the left side, we have the Speaker, Mic and lighting effects category. And on the rest of the body, you’ll find the adjustment options. Right now, you’re looking at the volume control where you can adjust the master volume and the balance between left and right driver. And if you’re wondering where are the other speaker options, then you’ll either have to double click or right click on the speaker icon.

Doing so will reveal a drop-down menu for other settings like sample rate, equalizer, Xear surround sound etc.

Same is the case with the Mic icon.

Getting back to the speaker, this is what the equalizer looks like. You have about 12 equalizers presets including the default. You can also create your own preset and save it.

Here’s a look at the Xear Surround Headphone settings, You can either enable or disable the Virtual 3D 7.1 setting from here. Then you also have the music or movie mode profile and the room size adjustment so you can move the speaker closers or further from you, virtually.

There’s not much to the microphone setting, other than the input volume controller, sample rate and a fun option called Xear Magic Voice. It’s more like a voice changer that makes you sound like a monster or a duck when speaking with this option enabled. I personally would’ve like to seen more magic voice profiles here as sometimes it’s fun to mess with people in online games ;)

As for LED effects goes, we have about 8 different LED effects including the static effect. And you can see these LED effects in action in the video embedded below.

Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 LED Effects:

I didn’t include the Music effect in the video because it just blinks two different pre-selected colors in sync with beats on the tracks you’re playing. It would’ve been difficult to sync the effect with the background music in the video. Also, the Music effect is not to be mistaken with the equalizer music effect.

Microphone Quality:

The Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 features a retractable boom mic. It also has a Red LED ring on it which looks somewhat awesome. However, this LED stays enabled whether the microphone is enabled or not. So that’s something which can be improved as it would be a great indicator letting you know whether the microphone is enabled or not.

As for the quality goes, it’s not the best microphone out in the market. You can understand the words being spoken on the other end but it sounds a little bit muffled.

User Experience & Conclusion:

The Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 headphone is a candy of mixed taste to me. I really like the stereo performance of the headphone and the fact that you don’t really need to max out your master volume thanks to those 50mm Neodymium drivers with the powerful audio production. Also, it was great to see that there was no distortion present even at very high volume, which in-case of some other headphones, just flat out fail.

And thanks to the software, you have a plethora of options to play around with. If you’re watching a movie and need that extra explosive punch, or need a little more bass when listening to music, or want to make your own sound preset, you can do all that in the equalizer. And that’s not the extent of the software, there are still options like Xear Audio Brilliant, Xear Dynamic Bass, Xear Smart Volume, Xear Magic Voice and more that you can play around with.

Even though the headphone can produce very promising audio quality in stereo setting, the virtual 3D 7.1 surround doesn’t seem to cut it, even though it’s marketed in the product’s name itself.

One thing that Tt eSPORTS need to work on this headphone is surely the comfortability. The headphone is an over-ear headphone, however, due to the diameter and the circular shape of the earcups, it makes the headphone a partial over-ear headphone. I say that because of the situations I mentioned in the Body & Comfort section. The earcups don’t have either the ideal shape or the diameter for my ears. A better solution would’ve been oval earcup and rounded cushions in my opinion. Then again, the comfortability being an issue for me, may not be for you. So if you’re in the market for headphone, make sure to wear and try these out as well.

There’s one more sector where I believe the Tt eSPORTS’s could have done better, the in-line controller. The In-line controller does feature RGB LED, but only on the Logo. This is good when you have to find the controller in dark environment, but it doesn’t really matter if you can’t see the buttons on it. So it would’ve been better to implement the RGB LEDs on the buttons as well. Which is almost impossible to identify in dark environment, unless you have remembered them. Also, the EQ button on the in-line controller cycles through 4 different presets, but it doesn’t cycle through the ones you’ve created and saved. So, if you’ve pressed the EQ button either knowingly or by mistake, there’s no other way of going back to your created profile other than accessing the software itself. This is something I believe can be sorted out with a simple software/firmware update.

As for the microphone quality goes, it’s not the best but it’s good enough to be heard and understood on the other side.

The headphone does feature some good LED effects that bring out the true aesthetic feature of the headphone in the crowd. It looks really appealing to everyone with all the 16.8 million color spectrum cycling through the cans of the headphone. And I think Tt eSPORTS can include some more LED effects to this product to further impress the RGB lovers out there.

Now to conclude the review, let’s have a look at the price of the headphone. Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing 7.1 headphone is available on Amazon for $77.21. Considering that the headphone has a very decent and promising stereo performance, but the fact the I cannot keep up with it for more than 30 minutes without re-adjusting it, and also that the virtual surround sound isn’t very promising, I would like to rate the Tt eSPORTS Cronos Riing RGB 7.1 3.5 out of 5 stars. There’s also some improvements need to be made to the inline controller. If Tt eSPORTS were to come out with a headphone that features the same interior, better and comfortable exterior, improved inline controller minus the time and efforts put on the virtual surround sound, I would say that they will bring about a great stereo headphone to the market.