These new wireless PS5 headsets from Turtle Beach don’t make much sense

Turtle Beach announced PlayStation versions of its flagship Stealth 700 Gen 2 Max ($199.95) and the slightly less feature-filled Stealth 600 Gen 2 Max ($129.95) wireless gaming headsets. They’re available to preorder now, and they’ll release on October 2nd, 2022. These are almost identical to the Xbox-specific version released earlier in 2022 down to some of the same colorway options, consisting of all black with some silver accents or blue with bronze accents. But there’s one big change in the newer PlayStation-specific versions that I think might actually disappoint some gamers who aren’t in the know: the wireless audio transmitter isn’t compatible with Xbox.

Looking back at the Stealth 700 and 600 Gen 2 Max editions for Xbox, the wireless transmitter that’s paired to these headsets supports both Xbox and PlayStation via its toggle switch — among many other platforms, like PS4, Nintendo Switch (via its dock), and PC. What’s a little more strange now is that these older but functionally superior headsets each cost $20 less than the new PlayStation models.

Image: Turtle Beach

Image: Turtle Beach

Comparing the two families of headsets, each Stealth 700 Gen 2 Max claims to offer over 40 hours of battery life per charge (my colleague Richard Lawler attests to the solid battery life as well as it being very handy to have a headset that works with all consoles.) The Stealth 600 Gen 2 Max can go over 48 hours, apparently.

I’ve reached out to Turtle Beach to figure out exactly who these PlayStation-angled headsets were made for, aside from people who don’t know how to glean hardware specs. I’ll update this post if the company responds with anything substantial, but if you need one of these headsets now, just get the Xbox-specific versions instead of waiting for these lesser models to release in October.