Zowie’s Vital is supposed to be the combination of three different aspects: ease of use, personalization and consistent sound quality. Combined, the three would simplify and streamline sound card usage.We’ve seen how the Sennheiser GSX 1000 performed but can the Zowie Vital give it a run for its money?
The Zowie Vital is, in the simplest of terms, an external audio card that has a Hi-Fi grade DAC (Digital to Analogue Converter) chipset for high-resolution sound quality. But before I get into how well it performs when it comes to sound quality, let’s talk about the design.
Unplugged, the Zowie Vital resembles one of those brick-like power banks. It measures 65mm x 21mm x 100 mm and as a result doesn’t take up a lot of space on your desk. Plugging it in lights up the white LED-lit touch panel with the Zowie logo at the top. On the front face, you have two 3.55 mm ports, one for the input and output jacks, while the back of the device has a power port and 3.5 mm output speaker port. All in all, it’s a simple looking device with no moveable parts, that’s perhaps a touch too bare.
The LED panel itself has a series of dotted lights running up the middle that serves as the instrument to measure either the volume, bass or treble, all of which you can change by simply tapping their respective icons. Selecting any of the three, you can then tap the negative or positive sign to fine tune your listening experience. Near the bottom of the device, you can tap the headset or speaker icon to switch between the output devices whilst tapping the mic icon mutes your microphone. The last icon which you can toggle is the lock icon, which prevents you from accidentally altering any of the settings while simultaneously dimming said icons. On the downside, I found the majority of the LED lighting on my particular device to be quite spotty and not that bright.
So far, the Zowie Vital checks the box when it comes to ease of use and while the design may not be great, it isn’t terrible either. But how does it stack up in terms of performance?
The Zowie Vital is specifically meant for competitive eSports, letting you take it along with you to your next LAN competition. I found the audio to be quite clean, with a minimal of noise, something that’s a hazard when using an onboard soundcard. The maximum playback bit rate is 96 kHz/24bit whilst the maximum recording bit rate is 96 kHz/16bit. Due to the USB powered Hi-Fi Amp, enough power is provided to drive high-impedance headphones (up to 250 Ohms). The microphone was again quite clear when I tested it out in Audacity and was faster when it came to picking up any sound.
The Absolute Verdict? The Zowie Vital is a great device that’s both intuitive and quite capable when it comes to sound performance. However, the barebones design and steep price are a bit of an issue, it retails for $200, which is $40 less than the Sennheiser GSX 1000, which provides far more fine tuning options. However, if you’re looking for a clean cut device to bring along to eSport competitions, the Vital will serve you well.
