Designed to Excite
EPOS products are crafted with passion for design, pioneering technology and love for detail.
At EPOS, we dedicate ourselves to designing the best solutions for individuals who demand excellence from their audio devices. Great design creates a bond between the consumer and brand. When the best components are brought together with our skills in audio engineering, when the finest materials are crafted into products that look and feel exactly right, the whole becomes greater than its parts. This commitment to design extends from the engineers tasked with maximizing the functional performance of a product, through the ergonomics specialists who ensure that a headset is comfortable to wear, to the visual designers who curate its aesthetic appeal.
The interaction of all these elements is necessarily complex, and we work closely across teams to create a harmonious balance of function, form, fit and feel. It’s a challenge to pull this off; we know we have succeeded when it looks effortless in the final product.
Designing the H3 and H6PRO Series
The H3 and H6PRO Series gaming headsets represents a major evolutionary step for our headset range. Our dedication to continuous product improvement and innovation, combined with feedback from gamers over many years of use, informed its new design elements.
From an audio standpoint, the engineering team tuned the speaker system to deliver that feeling of power and immediacy in the bass without extending into, or masking, an accurate and balanced midrange, alongside bright highs to ensure the clarity and detail of the audio imaging. With a new microphone configuration, the design team achieved its goals with a long, slim but robust boom arm that delivered both a sleek aesthetic and voice pick up performance and flexibility.
The engineering team was keen to look closely at the performance of the joint between the earcup assembly and headband, recognizing the importance of a tight acoustic seal for the widest possible range of head and face shapes without cranking up the clamping pressure. It turned out that the solution was already in their design playbook in the form of the highly adjustable dual axis hinge system of the top-of-the-range GSP 500 and 600 headsets. After careful assessment of materials and numerous iterations, the team hit upon a similar design to the tried and tested high end solution but within the constraints of a lighter, high value all-rounder headset. As a result, the H3 and H6PRO Series offer all the angular flexibility needed to create an excellent acoustic seal around the ears no matter the shape of the wearer’s head.
Attention to detail at the smallest scale is an equally important design goal. Ears are extremely sensitive organs full of their own peculiarities, especially in terms of susceptibility to pain from applied pressure. As a result, the H3 and H6PRO Series of headsets include drivers angled within the earcup such that no part of the speaker’s cover touches the ear, improving both comfort and acoustics.
Solving the challenges of in-ear comfort
The combination of exacting performance standards with the highest bar set for comfort drives the design decisions we make for all our headsets. When you move from over-ear category to those that will sit in-ear, such as the GTW 270 Hybrid, the challenges can be significant. Fortunately, engineers at EPOS were able to take advantage of owner Demant’s database of over 100,000 ear scans. Our teams are constantly encouraged to engage with their curiosity and used AI techniques to test numerous earbud designs against the statistical data. You can see from the diagram of an “average” ear that there are non-flexible areas where contact with an earbud will generate pain, areas where protrusions cause problems, and others which are more flexible. Careful analysis and iteration led to a design that satisfied the requirements for long-term comfort. In conjunction with the supplied earbud tips of different sizes, the gamer can ensure the seating in the opening of the ear canal is both tight and comfortable.
Three typical pain points in the ear. By removing pressure on the non-flexible areas, the GTW 270 earbuds ensure a stable, sealed and completely painless fit.
Confidence in the position the earbud would sit in the ear also allowed the team to tailor the exterior shape of the earbud such that it sat within the pinnae profile, giving an unobtrusive and sleek look.
Feeling fine, looking good
In addition to the function and overall form of every product, EPOS pays attention to its feel. The unmistakable tactile experience of premium materials and finishes is vital to deliver validation of the overall quality. We all know what it feels like to handle “tacky” plastics or poorly finished metals, and the symbiosis of soothing alloys, sleek shapes and high-quality polymer finishes completes the design circle.
At EPOS, we craft solutions with high-quality materials that are built to last by providing the perfect balance between excellent audio performance and maximum comfort.