Reviews// Pyramat Sound Rocker S2000

Of course, all of this might not come as so much of a surprise to anybody who has a full 5.1 Dolby surround sound set-up in their gaming lounge, bedroom or den – though how many people are actually that lucky (or rich enough) to be able to enjoy that? Especially if, like me, you’ve just shelled out a few hundred pounds on a new Nintendo Wii or Xbox 360 set-up, and you are currently trying to put a little bit aside every month to take the sting out of the £425 you are going to need when the PlayStation 3 arrives on March 23rd. But even then, there is something about the physicality of actually feeling the sound and the vibrations of the speakers so close to your ears, ass and liver, that I’ve never actually experienced outside of the arcade.

So with that in mind, while the Pyramat S2000 is by no means cheap (it retails in the UK at £150 exclusively through Debenhams) it’s certainly one of the cheapest and most straightforward surround sound solutions for single-player gaming that I’ve come across. Over time, the design of the thing actually grew on me and, while it’s clearly aimed at a younger market of teens and boy-racers (check the neon-blue glow of the power light!) it’s actually also quite nifty and not as impractical as it first appeared, as you can fold it in half and chuck it in a cupboard if, like me, you live in a shoebox flat in town. The black fabric that surrounds the chair, which doesn’t look particularly nice at first glance, also turns out to be pretty hard-wearing. I’ve caned Zelda and numerous other games on this over the past month, while using it on a hard and unforgiving wooden floor. Yet it still looks like I’ve just taken it from the box. Impressive.

Also, as mentioned, you can plug in your iPod or pretty much any home or portable audio device, via one of two RCA inputs. So the chair adds a whole new dimension to PSP and DS gaming at home. Headphones are a thing of the past.

Gripes
In all honesty, the build-quality could be better. The fact that you can see some of the staples holding the material to the back of the chair is off-putting, ugly and unnecessary – it would only have taken an extra slip of material to cover this. A minor gripe, but a gripe nonetheless.

Also, although this is more a general problem with the sedentary pastime that is videogaming, after five or more hours sat at one gaming session, your bum does starts to hurt a little bit. After all, you are effectively sitting on a glorified cushioned speaker. However, if you have sat for five or more hours straight playing Zelda without drinking, wee-ing or interacting with others then you will probably not mind a numb bum. Plus, my back didn’t hurt halfway near as much as it would have done had I been slumped on a sofa for five hours straight. Perhaps the The Pyramat S2000 Sound Rocker finally marks the end of all those costly Osteopath sessions??

It should also be said that the chair is less than 50cm wide, so if are a ‘Barry Big Butt’ then forget it right now. You’ll be seeping over the edge.

Audio-wise, the sub-woofer does have a tendency to sound a bit fuzzy and crackly at higher volumes on the S2000 model we tried out, although it should be pointed out that we are talking about the kind of volumes that had our neighbours in the flat below banging on the ceiling…Which, incidentally, reminds me of another reason why I liked the thing. At any kind of normal volume, the chair is very hard to hear in the next room (or flat) – so, in my opinion, it solves the problem of wanting high-volume surround sound gaming if you live in a small space with touchy neighbours (ie most of the population of London).

The flipside to this is that if you set the volume at a low level on the television, you can still get a fully immersive surround sound effect via the Pyramat chair. For me, this is a real godsend as, like most city-dwellers, I live in a flat with people in other flats above, below and to either side of me and my neighbours (not to mention my wife) will no longer complain about the noise anymore when I’m partaking of a late night Gears of War or (more likely) yet more Zelda sessions.

The final gripe, again a rather minor one, is that the chair’s power leads and the audio leads do tend to clutter up the room, but then again, that’s mainly due to having grown used to having the (relatively recent) wireless gaming set-ups of the Wii and the 360. No doubt future versions of the The Pyramat S2000 Sound Rocker will be wireless. For now, I don’t really mind too much.

Now, maybe if I tell that Pyramat PR fella that my flat was burgled….

Summary
The Pyramat S2000 Sound Rocker while looking like a teen boy-racer’s wet dream (a turn off!), actually turns out to be a solid and hugely enjoyable bit of gaming kit (a turn on!), quickly becoming both a handheld and home console essential in our reviewer’s house.

If you live in the country and don’t have neighbours and have pots of cash, then buy yourself the latest ultra-expensive Home Cinema surround sound set up from your local posh Hi-Fi shop. However, if you live in normal world, then get one of these.