Razer Piranha Gaming Communicator

Piranha by name...

Anyway, when the Piranha was finally free and when we had finally got over the staggering length of the cable, we were free to check out the other features of the headset. Adjustable headband? Soft ear-cups? Volume control dongle? Pulsing blue Razer symbol? Check, check, check…and hey, look at how long that cable is too!

I can’t really think of a reason why anybody would need a three metre long cable for their Gaming Communicator headset, but never mind. I’m sure it couldn’t just be so that people relented and invested in some Razer cable tidies – that would be far too cynical!

The general aesthetic of the Piranha is pretty striking too, especially those flared tips on the end of the ear cups and the soft, rubbery microphone that pivots down and is fully malleable.

At first glance I wanted to put the Piranhas on so that the flared tips pointed forwards, but that turned out to be wrong – the flared tips point backwards and I know that because the microphone will only swing about 90 degrees in one direction. Or, in other words; no, you can’t be cool and put them on back-to-front as if the Piranhas were some sort of stylish baseball cap. It just won’t work.

They Can Smell Blood

The first thing to test with any headset is, contrary to what you might think, not anything to do with the audio. Instead, it’s to do with how comfortable the headset it. Just as games have the old gameplay/graphics tradeoff, headsets have to offer the right blend of both comfort and clarity.

The Piranha could offer the best sound performance and audio quality ever and you’d still never wear it if it made you eyes bleed, would you?

Unfortunately, the Piranha falls down for me at the first hurdle as the headset really just isn’t that comfortable to use at all. The ear cups are very small and the cushions are made to sit atop the ear, rather than around it. This means that if you’re a bespectacled variety of geek then you’ll have the arms of your glasses constantly being forced into the side of your skull. Even when I took my glasses off, I found the pressure eventually began to mount up and become painful.


There isn’t an awful amount of adjustment available in the headset either and each ear cup can only be pulled down two centimetres, meaning that if you’ve got an especially large skull or a very cold house that requires you to wear a woolly hat while you game you may struggle to make the Piranhas fit.

Fortunately, Razer has got some of the design right and the overall look of the Piranha pretty striking and sharp, especially when used alongside other Razer products. Currently I have a Razer DeathAdder and ProType keyboard on my desk and the pulsing blue logos on each of them is pleasantly hypnotic if you’re into that sort of thing (fanboy – Ed).