Headsets have always been one of PC gamers’ best friends,
But headphones are slowly catching on. Not everyone likes the feeling of a full headset in a closed case, and some people are looking for something easy to use both on the road and at the battle station. Wireless headphones are a particularly lightweight alternative to traditional headphones, keeping your head relatively free. And this pair will allow you to listen to two different sources at the same time.
Multipoint communication for wireless devices is not new, but most implementations do not allow for all at once. Instead, they may need to manually switch or perform actions such as connecting to your phone when it specifically receives a phone call. But according to Gizmodo Genki’s new Waveform headphones let you do more.
The Human Things company behind Genki called this new feature DualStream.
This will allow you to play a game on your PC during a phone call and both will stream through the same set of wireless headphones. For those who want to free their computer from other processes while playing, this can be very useful, especially for gaming on the go. Another use case could be, for example, using Zoom while listening to music. The important part here: two devices, one set of headphones, at the same time, without wires. But there is a small snag.
The headphone charging case can be connected to audio devices via a cable, be it an audio jack, USB C, or lightning. This acts as a key that allows most devices to send a signal to the Waveform headphones even if they don’t have their own wireless capabilities. This is how the new Genki headphones are able to give two streams at once, one of them must be through this adapter.
It’s a little disappointing at first, knowing that you can’t just initially pair two Bluetooth devices when that seems like a big part of this product’s premise. However, the case is small, and plugging it into something like a PC or laptop would probably not be a big deal. It also extends functionality to many more devices than normal Bluetooth mode, although it can also mean that some wireless features don’t work as usual. Ultimately, this still seems like a step up from computer dongle and Bluetooth solutions.
Waveform Buds currently looking for funding on Kickstarter,
But given that Human Things has a good track record on the platform, that’s not as red-hot as it could be. Plus, you’ll find the weirdest and most interesting-looking PC peripherals here, like this hand controller. The company also said that it already has the chips in place to start production, so hopefully, delays won’t be an issue.
You can currently get one of the first sets of headphones for $199, which is an expensive set of headphones, but given the unique functionality, it might be worth it.
