Review cover Razer Seirēn Emote Microphone (Hardware)
Official GBAtemp Review

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Razer's at it again, this time, with their RGB fanaticism leading to a microphone that lets you be both seen and heard.
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<p>Razer continues to go all-in on gaming hardware, adding to its repertoire of keyboards by creating accessories made for dedicated video game streamers. These days, with voice chatting being so prevalent, you&#39;re going to want to make sure you have a good microphone, regardless if you&#39;re streaming on Twitch, or playing games with your squad on Discord. For those that want to make themselves heard, Razer has released the Seiren Emote, a streaming microphone that is, of course, accompanied by RGBs.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Not too long ago, Razer released the Seiren X microphone, the distant relative of the newer Seiren Emote. This mic takes the same foundations that built the X, but adds in a few new flashier features to make it more conducive to streaming by making the microphone itself&nbsp;more interactive with your audience. Amusingly, you can be both seen and heard with the Emote, thanks to the pixel-art styled LED display featured on the front of the device.&nbsp;</p>

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<p>Coming in an unassumingly small size, the Emote is a hyper-cardioid condenser microphone, about as tall as your average Yeti mic, but much thinner in profile. It&#39;s held up by a gooseneck stand, which actually does a great job at holding up the microphone, even at dramatically tilted angles. However, with the fact that you&#39;re going to always want this microphone to be facing upwards as to best showcase the mic&#39;s RGBs, it makes anything other than the default position redundant.&nbsp;</p>

<p>When it came to the bread-and-butter of the Seiren Emote, the audio, I found I was able to switch between it and my old Yeti mic with my friends blindly and incorrectly guessing that I was using my Blue Yeti, only to be shocked when I revealed that it was the Razer all along. I also found out that my high-pitched voice tended to not clip the mic or cut me out as much as the Yeti did, though I preferred the overall local recording quality of the latter. The mic does do an honestly good job at capturing your audio, and if you decide to use it for streams, your sound quality will be crisp and clear.</p>

<div class="greyBox">Tech Specs</div>

<ul>
<li>Power required / consumption: 5V 500mA</li>
<li>Sample rate: min 44.1kHz / max 48kHz</li>
<li>Bit rate: 16bit</li>
<li>Capsules: &Oslash;25mm condenser capsules</li>
<li>Polar patterns: Hypercardioid</li>
<li>Frequency response: 100Hz&ndash;20kHz</li>
<li>Sensitivity: 20mV/Pa (at 1kHz)</li>
<li>Max SPL: 110dB (THD &lt; 1% at 1kHz)</li>
</ul>

<p>Since this is a hyper-cardioid microphone, if you place it off to the side&nbsp;it won&#39;t pick up much of your keyboard clack. That makes it better for when you&#39;re gaming or chatting through a voice call, because hearing errant keyboard strokes can be incredibly distracting. Sometimes, a few clicks will make their way through, but overall the mic does a nice job at filtering out background noise.&nbsp;</p>

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<p>So, the main reason you&#39;re looking at the Seiren Emote is probably due to the RGB factor. Just how does a microphone manage to mix visuals into the equation? Razer&#39;s answer is to incorporate an LED screen into the mic. You can then use this to express yourself through the 8x8 screen by&nbsp;converting images into 8-bit form, making your own pixel art, or using pre-existing GIFs provided by Razer. You&#39;re only limited by your pixel count and your creativity. The RGBs are bright, if not a little too bright, to the point where a few colors look a little inaccurate, but I found myself enjoying the light-show factor that the mic provided.</p>

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<p>I can see some genuinely fun uses coming from the custom 8-bit emotes that you can make--perhaps references to in-jokes from your streams, or just fun images for subscribers to see. You will have to download Razer&#39;s Synapse software to customize all these features, and then you&#39;ll need yet another piece of Razer software on top, which is aggravating, but also a necessity. Razer&#39;s software is incredibly hit or miss, but here it does an acceptable job.&nbsp;</p>

<p>As much fun as it is to watch this microphone light up and play around with your own custom pixelart, the enjoyment comes at a cost. At $179.99, the Seiren Emote is much more expensive than its other cardioid-condenser competitors--pricey enough to offset any potential consumers who aren&#39;t interested in the very specific use-case of using the microphone for facecam streams with a preexisting audience. You can certainly have fun with the Seiren Emote, and it is by no means a bad piece of hardware, but there&#39;s not enough of a draw to justify buying it, for the average consumer.&nbsp;</p>

Verdict

What We Liked ...
  • LED screen allows for audience interactivity if you have a facecam
  • Really useful gooseneck stand
  • Has passthrough
What We Didn't Like ...
  • Price
  • Is more of a novelty item than anything else
  • No gain knob
7
out of 10

Overall

With the price point as high as it is, Razer's Seiren Emote microphone is certainly a fun product, but is mostly a novelty purely geared towards streamers looking to have fun with some quirky features. If that's your cup of tea, then that's great, but most should probably look towards a more traditional mic at a lower cost.
i bought a cardiod mic with boom arm, stabilizing cradle, pop filter and wind sock for 80 bucks last year and it's specs are:
192kHz/24bit
flat frequency response of 30Hz-16kHz

i cannot understand why razer would think it's a good idea to have that premium a price while under performing those mics you see on amazon for around 40 dollars.
 
Razer used to be known for offering premium PC peripherals... these days their reputation is "those pricks that stick lights in everything".
 
Razer used to be known for offering premium PC peripherals... these days their reputation is "those pricks that stick lights in everything".
i've always only known them as some memebrand for gamers, when did they ever have premium peripherals?
 
i've always only known them as some memebrand for gamers, when did they ever have premium peripherals?
10-15 years ago, when they were one of the only companys manufacturing decent mechanical keyboards suited to gamers. Their early optical mice were also far superior to any other consumer level mice of the period.
...but over the last decade they've slowly become the meme worthy LED company that just happens to find ways of wrapping gaming tech around their lightshows.
 
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