It hasn’t been that long since Audeze revealed its intensions to move from the heart of its beloved audiophile crowd and touch down on the lucrative market of video gaming. Initially, the OC-based company went big with the Mobius, including head tracking and a slew of digital niceties to add to their core of planar magnetic technologies.
Now, a new effort has silently slid into the market. The Audeze LCD-GX popped up at the High End Munich show this year with not so much as a trumpet blast, and then even more covertly popped up on the company website this week.
Two of the most interesting talking points on the new LCD-GX is undoubtably the open-back design and the price. Most, if not all gaming headphones are closed-back or in-ear arrangements. An open-back design would no doubt have a substantial effect on delivering superior bass, imaging, breathability and overall openness, but how Audeze chooses to deal with the outside bleed is still to be determined.
Also worthy of note is the inclusion of two cables. While the boom mic cable may appear as a given, there is also a standard LCD series cable in the box as well. Perhaps the Venn diagram between gamer and audiophile has a meeting point that crosses over somewhere near the GX’s sweet spot, but only time will tell.
The Mobius is currently retails for $400, even that price tag is near the top of the pile for the gaming category. According to the company site, the GX is slated for $899 and a July 2019 release. While this is a more entry-level note on the hifi side of the product line, it still takes a substantial foothold as a premium gaming headphone any way you slice it.
Still, the Audeze house sound is a sweet one. And one that has earned its residence in the hearts of personal audio enthusiasts by listening to its core audience and constantly pushing the envelope for what is possible forward. The newest products are consistently the best for what they do, so it might be easy to say that the GX will bring a lot of the learnings and insight from the rest of the Audeze lot along with it.
More info: https://www.audeze.com/products/lcd-collection/lcd-gx