To test the RumbleFX I used the product with the Turtle Beach Montego II Quadzilla sound card on an Intel Pentium III 766 MHz running Windows 98. The RumbleFX was tested with Quake II, along with the Telarc Surround Sounds CD, and a few MP3s as well.

Since Evergreen is really marketing this product to gamers, the game performance is quite important. I was very impressed with the performance while playing. The first test came with a single player game of Quake II. The first thought I had when I plugged them in while playing Quake II was "this is totally unbelievable"! Using the headset just seemed to add a totally new dimension to the game.

One of the things I noticed right away was "feeling the rumbles" of what I once heard as basic background noises (that I would usually block out after a short time). If you have a decent 3D sound card with positional audio you will be able to hear and feel the direction enemy fire comes from, and also be able to tell which direction enemies in the game are walking in. This certainly gives you the advantage as you can actually hear and feel the opponent before you see them.

As I mentioned earlier, using the RumbleFX and playing with the game soundtrack on isn't always a good idea, as the force feedback will be working on the extreme side to produce the vibrations for the music and the in-game action. Of course action/shooter games with lots of enemy noises and constant action and ammunition going off all around you seems to make the most of the RumbleFX, but any game with some bass will give you the feedback effect. As far as sound reproduction goes, the enemies and weapon sounds are reproduced very well, with no perceptible distortion. It is definitely high quality sound and it creates a rather amazing gaming experience.

As far as audio outside of what is in a game goes, the RumbleFX handles that with little to almost no distortion as well. The first audio test I did was using a great little sound sampler CD called Telarc Surround Sounds. This CD is a nice mix of musical and sonic audio tracks. In the first track, for example you go through an interesting mix of a rooster crowing, horns, piano, opera, a train, and more. One track in particular "Hopper Dance" performed by the Empire Brass Quintet was simply amazing to listen to with the RumbleFX force feedback effects. When listening to music, once again the RumbleFX force feedback effects are really only heard and felt the most when there is a bit of bass in the audio. Music with the RumbleFX is unquestionably an interesting experience.

Despite how well the music works with the RumbleFX I still see this as a product that really, only gamers would get the most out of it.