This week, SteelSeries unveiled the new white series of its Arctis Nova Pro headset. The original Nova Pro wireless headset came out in 2022 and, despite a hefty price tag, cemented itself as one of the most enjoyable headsets I’ve ever used. The white series brings a sleek new look to what was already a good thing, but there’s a little something extra under the hood here. The Arctis Nova Pro white series has seen some improvements in its new version and I got to see for myself what it can do in addition to getting a fresh new look.
All the things that were good, and just a bit better
If you want my full thoughts on the Arctis Nova Pro series headset as a whole, you should check out my previous Shacknews review. All of those points still stand, but SteelSeries has actually addressed a few points I left in my cons since the original launched that are packed into this new white edition from there start. It’s still a great wireless headset with long battery life, great sound, and a very easily swappable set of rechargeable battery packs. It’s also still got great noise canceling and transparency modes.
The upgrades to the control deck were quite refreshing right out of the box. One of my few critiques in my original review was that the Arctis Nova Pro couldn’t access sound presets without the help of the Sonar companion app. That’s no longer the case since an update to the original that comes packed in here. Several sound presets are now loaded into and directly accessible from the control deck, including Apex Legends, Baldur’s Gate, Diablo 4, and much more. Why does that matter? Because you couldn’t access those presets on console play when I first reviewed it. Now you can, making the Arctis Nova Pro just as good for console gaming as it was for PC.
The noise canceling modes have also seen some upgrades. Another of my previous critiques was that the noise canceling and transparency modes didn’t scale with the audio volumes. It still doesn’t, but now there are settings to adjust the volume level of these specific settings. If you want to hear everything outside the cushy earcups loud and clear, you can crank the volume in these settings up. If you still want them fading into the background of whatever you’re listening to, you can do that too. Simply put, with the release of the white series, the Arctis Nova Pro has upped its game in very specific and appreciated ways.
This Nova is shining brighter
I’m a little bit tickled pink that not only did SteelSeries release a stylish new look for the Arctis Nova Pro, but it also almost directly addresses issues I had with the original right out of the package. The price tag is still hefty, and the pop filter on the retractable mic still doesn’t make much sense to me, but this is definitely still one of the best headsets in gaming and it just got even better. Even if it were just a palette swap, I’d still recommend the Arctis Nova Pro as a gold standard among gaming audio, but the improvements of built-in sound presets and upgraded noise cancelation make this already solid offering just a bit sweeter.
These impressions are based on a sample unit sent by the manufacturer. The white SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro headset is available now at a retail price of $349.99 in Xbox/PC and PlayStation/PC variants at SteelSeries.com.
-
Shacknews
replyTJ Denzer posted a new article, SteelSeries White Arctis Nova Pro improves on one of the best headsets in gaming
