Over the past few months I have been fortunate to review most of Razer's new products. With the release of new product Razer has branched out from being a company that makes mice to one that makes all sorts of PC gaming hardware. They have taken what they have learned from making mice and used it to design keyboards, accessories, and audio equipment. While the obvious outlier here is the company's venture into the highly competitive field of audio equipment, they have been moving along smoothly and seem to have met with a fair amount of success.

While we all have been waiting to check out Razer's sound card, they released the Barracuda HP-1 headphones first so we have had a few months to play with them first. This surround sound headset was an appreciable accomplishment for the company, but I felt like it could not really be completely judged until used with the Razer sound card. After all, while they do not have to be used together, they are a matched pair. So my hope is that by using them together we will be able to get the most out of each. It could just be a clever marketing scheme combined with a strange connector though, so we'll see.

In their product material Razer tells us that the AC-1 uses Razer's Fidelity system to bring "optimized audio signals directly from the computer game to the gamer, creating the most realistic gaming environment." The audio card also uses Razer's Enhanced Sonic Perception and 3D Positional Gaming Audio Engine for better directional sound effects than found on past equipment. Impressed yet? Well, don't worry, there is a lot more to talk about than a few trademark technologies and marketing materials.