I've just about reached the conclusion that I need to replace my venerable Logitech Clearchat Pro headset. Despite being fitted with a nominally Noise Cancelling mic, it doesn't seem to matter whether I have the FO voice set really low (so low I struggle to hear it) on the external mini-speakers, or even routed through the headset itself, the mic still picks up the FO's voice and tries to interpret it as voice commands, leading Trav or Andy to go off on a feedback loop rant as he keeps answering himself over and over and over and over and over and....

 

Ahem.

 

So, does anyone have any recommendations or particularly good experiences with headsets, specifically with MCE and voice recognition in general? Personally I'd prefer USB, but I have a spare soundcard output for regular audio connectors if required. My personal situation means that noise cancelling for the headphones (i.e. cutting out external noise from what I hear) isn't a priority, and since I'd only use it for voice comms, monaural would be fine. What I really need is good noise cancelling on the microphone.

 

(Note to AVSIM Mods: I'm asking this here rather than on the hardware forums because I'm looking for a headset for use solely with MCE. I trust the members here to be more familiar with the requirements and less likely to unwittingly give bad advice based on different criteria. Please don't move this topic, unless the FS++ team object to it being here.)

 

Thanks in advance

 

Dr V

I bought a M$ Livechat Usb headset because it was in sale, there is an equivalent Logitech one that also looks good.

 

Quality has been great, dot have issues with it, in fact now i can hear things i couldnt before! Lol

So, does anyone have any recommendations or particularly good experiences with headsets, specifically with MCE and voice recognition in general? Personally I'd prefer USB, but I have a spare soundcard output for regular audio connectors if required. My personal situation means that noise cancelling for the headphones (i.e. cutting out external noise from what I hear) isn't a priority, and since I'd only use it for voice comms, monaural would be fine. What I really need is good noise cancelling on the microphone.

 

Have a look at the Logitech G930. Works great with MCE.

You can adjust, beside volume, the level of microphone, and the level of feedback (your voice through the head-set.)

It is wireless and charged by usb.

 

succes,

 

Etienne

I own the Microsoft Live Chat USB. It appears to be optimised for voice rather than full-range fidelity.. It does work, not only with MCE, but also with FS2Crew and VAC (Voice Activated Commands) programs. Not totally convinced as to any noise cancelling properties of its microphone however.

 

All told not a patch of my Razer headphones/mic but it plugs into a proprietary sound card (not USB) and thus less suited to MCE et al.

 

Best of luck.

I was in the same situation...had been using a Plantronics wireless USB headset however I was completely disappointed with its ability to work well with MCE. It continually made an in-speaker sound as if it were recycling the frequency or possibly waking itself up from sleep if I hadn't said anything over several minutes...additionally, the FO would always be asking me for clarification on the command I had just given, when I hadn't issued any command at all!! overall just not a solid connection for voice recognition with my setup. My primary purpose for the wireless was to eliminate another set of wires! but after experiencing these issues, and reading up on voice recognition in general, I realized I needed to go the wired route if I wanted to eliminate issues and really enjoy MCE worry-free (again, just my preference). I ended up splashing out for a Sennheiser PC350 along with a new Asus sound card. Not the cheapest route I could've gone, but I'm more than thrilled at the difference in MCE performance with the new headphones (plus they don't crush the outer edges of my ears and they're a very quiet, closed headset)....not a single command is dropped or misunderstood.

 

Mainly I've been flying GA lately and just using it with ATC, also flawlessly. I can use RW abbreviations/shortcuts with ATC and it still goes thru, simply because MCE seems to be 'hearing' the keywords wonderfully...it greatly enhances the realism! I'm sure some of the other headset options that wouldn't strain the wallet as much as this did mine will still work great, but the Sennheiser, for me, is a perfect balance of quality and comfort, and overall enjoyment and I hope to use them for many years to come! of course, ymmv....Good luck on your search!!

I agree with Alan. I ordered a Sennheiser PC350 a few weeks ago and use it together with creative x-fi Titanium. Works perfect with MCE and all the other stuff, but it is expensive. Best headset in my opinion.

 

Kurt

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

 

The Sennheiser and G930 look perfect but blimey, a little outside my price range. In the end I went for the more wallet-friendly M$ LifeChat 3000.

 

Here's a cautionary tale - I installed it, ran through both the default MS training and the MCE specific training, then eagerly fired up FSX & MCE to test it. And got absolutely shocking recognition performance... Anything past "What's your name?" and "What's our call sign?" failed to recognize correctly. I relaunched MCE with the "tune microphone" option ticked, read the bit about Peter talking to his computer, only to get the response that windows couldn't hear me very well, despite the fact the volume level indicator showed my words were loud enough.

 

After a little more fruitless tinkering I went into the "listen" tab on the control panel sound devices setup, setting it so I could hear the mic input through the headphones and revealed... noise. Tons and tons of distorted noise. No wonder Windows & MCE were struggling to hear me. Silently cursing Appliance and W269 for steering me towards such a duff headset* I was all set to bin it and go back to my old Logitech, when a thought occurred... maybe plugging it into a different USB port to re-install it as a new device might improve things. So I unplugged it from the USB hub and plugged it straight into the front of the PC.

 

Crystal clear sound.

 

As you've probably guessed, I strongly suspect the USB hub to be the cause of the noise, even though digital audio shouldn't be prone to the same sort of audio interference as analogue headsets. Anyway the LifeChat's performance now is great. Recognition is back up in the 90% range, although strangely it now seems to struggle with a different set of words to before (it "Tune COM1 to Ground" is now hit and miss). More importantly the microphone is now less prone to picking up ambient sounds and the FO doesn't hear his own voice (which I have coming through small secondary external speakers) anwhere near as much - I had him respond once to the purser reading the safety briefing over the main speakers and once to the mechanic through the whole flight, whereas previously every few commands he'd have a fit.

 

I also noticed, listening to the mic output, that the M$ headset picks up a lot less breath noise than my old Logitech set, which is good for me considering the two wet paper bags I have for lungs. The old Logitech headset I've been using (an older version of the ClearChat models currently available) picked up a lot of wheezing and heavy breathing, not to mention lots of extraneous room noise, leading to the problems I was having, despite being supposedly noise cancelling. I don't know if it's just age or if headset technology has come on in the last five years, but the cheaper M$ LifeChat outperforms it by a country mile.

 

Thanks again to everyone for your advice.

 

 

Dr V

 

(*not really cursing you guys, it's all in fun! :lol: )

Glad you have arrived at a suitable outcome.

 

BTW not offended at your cursing ... I know it WAS real ... too old to care

Since I joined the club of MCE users, after having tested the demo for 3-4 days (about a month ago), I would like to say that I have very good results with the 2 following devices (both from Microsoft):

 

- LifeChat LX-4000

- LifeCam HD-5000

 

I ended up using the (microphone portion of the) camera, because I'm not used to having something over/around my head.

 

 

 

PS: Right now, I'm doing my first full (no demo) MCE flight, with PMDG MD-11, from Denver to Fairbanks.

I ended up using the (microphone portion of the) camera, because I'm not used to having something over/around my head.

 

I'd be interested in hearing how that works out, since that sort of mic is designed to pick up as wide a range of sounds from the room as possible. I'd expect it to pick up a lot of spurious stuff (like the problems I had with the copilot responding to his own voice in a long loop.

 

Dr V

I'd be interested in hearing how that works out, since that sort of mic is designed to pick up as wide a range of sounds from the room as possible. I'd expect it to pick up a lot of spurious stuff (like the problems I had with the copilot responding to his own voice in a long loop.

 

Dr V

 

So far so good.

 

I guess much would depend on the relative position of the camera, your mouth, and the speakers, and their relative distances from your mouth.

 

I have the camera about 70-80cm away, but its microphone is directed towards me.

 

The speakers, are from a large normal stereo set-amplifier, but they are much further away in the room, about 1.5-2.0m from me.