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Good Vibrations


Sloan

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Well I know this will elicit many jokes, but I'm gunna go ahead anyway. I have two new pieces of hardware coming in the mail today as a late gift for valentines day from the girlfriend. Vibrating hardware to be exact. :oops: :lol:

buttkicker.jpg

audiofx.jpg

Thats right, vibrating headphones and a bass buttkicker to vibrate my chair. Now you can hear me scream in pain as you shoot me down and I vibrate right out of my chair.

I'll have some tentative reviews as soon as I get to play with them. Or as soon as they play with me.

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Wow. My neighbors are gunna kill me.

These things as a pair are awesome. Let me start with takeoff. When the motor is off, everything is quiet of course. No movement anywhere. As soon as I hit the ignition key, the seat starts vibrating with an ever increasing pulse (the prop spinning up). The kickback of smoke right before full ignition startled me the first time, and after a few pops from my seat and headset, the engine reached peak.

During normal flight there is a repetitive drone to the buzz, something which I imagine isn't far off from reality. Its weird at first, but afterwards its one of those things like flying with the trackIR - it wouldn't feel real without it.

Now is the fun part. Using my machine guns sends my seat bucking. The vibrations from my head and body even travel down to my flying hand, making it feel like theres almost force feedback coming from the joystick. It feels like it should.

Taking damage now has a realistic feel to it, and you feel everything coming apart at the seams. The chair is kicking my ass at this point, not with anything steady but random bumps and punts as my plane absorbs lead. I wish sometimes that IL-2 didn't kick you into third person mode as soon as you blew up, cause outside the plane an explosion feels less... explosive. But I see why they made that choice, because technically you'd be dead and wouldn't feel that explosion anyway.

These things are *fun*. :)

The sound quality on the headphones are around a B+ grade. I boosted the high end of my EQ up a bit, but as gaming headphones and for the price ($50), they're right where they should be in terms of sound quality.

I'm also getting some weird garbled noises during the menu screen of IL-2, though I think its something to do with my soundcard and not the headphones. Sounds like electric interference from my harddrive or something. Anyway its only a slight annoyance.

The only downside of the butt kicker is that my downstairs neighbors are eventually gunna complain. It isn't so much the bass as the fact that I'm sure theres a slight rumble coming from their ceiling.

All in all, for $150 the pair is a worthy purchase, and I feel it definitely engages me in the game that much further. Its somewhat frivolous to spend so much money to have my ass kicked around in a computer chair, but I believe deserve an ass kicking now and again. :wink:

On a side note, I'd be interested to hear if anyone knows what being in a WWII fighter likely "felt" like? What was the average amount of feedback during flight. Did using the machine guns rattle the plane you think?

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These things as a pair are awesome. Let me start with takeoff. When the motor is off, everything is quiet of course. No movement anywhere. As soon as I hit the ignition key, the seat starts vibrating with an ever increasing pulse (the prop spinning up). The kickback of smoke right before full ignition startled me the first time, and after a few pops from my seat and headset, the engine reached peak.

During normal flight there is a repetitive drone to the buzz, something which I imagine isn't far off from reality. Its weird at first, but afterwards its one of those things like flying with the trackIR - it wouldn't feel real without it.

Now is the fun part. Using my machine guns sends my seat bucking. The vibrations from my head and body even travel down to my flying hand, making it feel like theres almost force feedback coming from the joystick. It feels like it should.

Taking damage now has a realistic feel to it, and you feel everything coming apart at the seams. The chair is kicking my ass at this point, not with anything steady but random bumps and punts as my plane absorbs lead. I wish sometimes that IL-2 didn't kick you into third person mode as soon as you blew up, cause outside the plane an explosion feels less... explosive. But I see why they made that choice, because technically you'd be dead and wouldn't feel that explosion anyway.

These things are *fun*. :)

The sound quality on the headphones are around a B+ grade. I boosted the high end of my EQ up a bit, but as gaming headphones and for the price ($50), they're right where they should be in terms of sound quality.

I'm also getting some weird garbled noises during the menu screen of IL-2, though I think its something to do with my soundcard and not the headphones. Sounds like electric interference from my harddrive or something. Anyway its only a slight annoyance.

The only downside of the butt kicker is that my downstairs neighbors are eventually gunna complain. It isn't so much the bass as the fact that I'm sure theres a slight rumble coming from their ceiling.

All in all, for $150 the pair is a worthy purchase, and I feel it definitely engages me in the game that much further. Its somewhat frivolous to spend so much money to have my ass kicked around in a computer chair, but I believe deserve an ass kicking now and again. :wink:

On a side note, I'd be interested to hear if anyone knows what being in a WWII fighter likely "felt" like? What was the average amount of feedback during flight. Did using the machine guns rattle the plane you think?

Damn... that sounds AWESOME! I'm all about immersion and this sounds like it really kicked it up a notch.

I can't really provide an answer to your last questions but I will opine that 1) the Spit's mg kickback is a little ridiculous (greater than that of the cannons :?: :!: ) and 2) there would always be a slight drone... heck- even flying a cessna you can feel the rpm change through the seat of your pants and the yoke, so I think the "repetitive drone" is realistic.

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Oh I forgot to add one of the things I liked best about the force feedback. I'm not sure if the low frequencies are just coded into the game at the right spots (causing the seat to react), but when stressing my aircraft with turns that are too tight or dives that are too steep I definitely get corresponding feedback from my seat and headset. The normal "drone" increases and makes it seem like I'm doing something wrong, which in fact, I am. Now instead of going into a flat spin and being "oh I must have done something wrong" I can sort of feel it coming which tells me to adjust accordingly. I'm not sure if in real life you would feel this turbulance as you stress a plane, but it feels right here, and I'm not complaining.

Oh man, now I'm researching the new Sound Blaster line of cards. Will it ever end? :oops:

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Sounds (pun intended) like a lot of fun. Tell your downstairs neighbours that what they are hearing is your pet Danger Dog and sometimes it gets loose and, well, you'd rather not go into all the details but this is the 17th place you've had to move to this year. They shouldn't complain at all. :shock:

. . . Will it ever end?

No. And just about the time your rig can play FB/PF decently. . . .BoB will come out and we'll all have to start all over again. :roll:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Cool - tell me what you think of them and if you have any troubles. I've found the source of a low garble noise is having the vibration on. Luckily once you get in the game you can't notice it. Let me know if you have a similar issue so I can trace my problem.

I still love the headphones btw even with this small issue. They're very comfortable for long flights.

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No problems at all getting set up :)

No garbled sounds even with the vibration on. I haven't had a chance to try the mic out yet with the guys.

IL2 sounds are still a bit anemic (I'll have to test some more to be sure it's not a question of settings) but MS Flight Sim 2004 :shock: :twisted: B) is simply AWESOME!!! The engines sounds are amazing with these headphones... very very good B) . I'm lovin' em so far :D

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  • 9 months later...
  • 1. DDz Quorum

Hello again. Does the Buttkicker have a voltage step down to 12/9 volts or is it 110 volts :huh:

You can get 240V -> 110V transformers quite readily here in the UK.

If you have problems PM me and I'll see what I can arrange, we have a few US airbases in my area and these transformers are sold by a few shops.

Blairgowrie was going to email you btw ;).

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  • 2 weeks later...

My new toy has arrived. However I had to pay another £20 to parcelforce and the price of a transformer is ANOTHER £20 :rolleyes: so much for the cheap option! I have managed to "mod" a 110/240 volt shaver to provide the juice :) lucky I still had it. I am going to rehouse my puter in a new case and then get the mike, buttkicker and the seat modded to take the throttle and stick in the next week or so. Then I would like to fly with you guys :)

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