Can anyone find me some good 5.1 headphones for my TV?

Question

I live in the UK and I can't get surround sound so I want some 5.1 headphones at least. I would like one with wires (over a meter or so in length if possible) that I can plug into my TV. Can anybody find me a 5.1 headset that I can buy in the UK please?

Answer 1

Sure they do.  They have a single speaker that mounts in the middle of your forehead, two that cover your ears, another two for the back of your head, and a subwoofer you keep in your pocket. ;-)

Answer 2

Surround sound headphones have been developed - primarily for gaming purposes - that have multiple drivers in each ear cover. These drivers then replicate the placement of front and rear speakers. Here's a company that makes them. But, at $40 a pair, I wouldn't vouch for the sound quality:

http://www.xoxide.com/za51suulgahe.html?...

Surround sound simulation is also available for use with regular headphones. But, it's the electronics that drive the headphones that simulates the surround sound. So, you can use any headphones with the right electronics (I would recommend the Sennheiser HD series).

Yamaha has been experimenting with a technology called head-related transfer functions (HTRF) that simulates 5.1 surround sound using ordinary headphones.

When developing HRTF, they placed tiny microphones into listeners' ears and set them into an anechoic chamber that had a 5.1 surround sound system with proper speaker placement. They then measured the volume, phase relationship, and inherent delay of the sounds that reached each ear from the various surround sound speakers.

The way your brain determines that a sound is coming from a particular direction is to detect the volume of the sound in each ear, and the phase relationship and inherent delay of the sound entering each ear. If something is coming from your right, for example, it strikes your right ear first. Then, a tiny fraction of a second later, the sound makes its way around your head and strikes your left ear, at some reduced volume and with a bit of a phase offset (because of the delay).

Once they figured out how the ears pick up the audio differently from the different surround speakers, they were able to tweak the audio signals that represent each surround sound channel to be generated at such a volume, phase relationship, and delay that the brain thinks you're sitting in the middle of a surround sound system. When, in actuality, you're wearing headphones.

http://hometheater.about.com/od/headphon...

A company called Smyth Research took this one step further. They include a headset with microphones in them that you wear while listening to your surround sound system. A microprocessor then fugures out what signal conditioning is needed for each of the audio channels to get the surround sound effect out of standard headphones. This "calibration" step ensures that the surround sound you hear through the headphones is exactly like what you hear through your own surround sound system (5.1, 6.1, or 7.1).

http://hometheater.about.com/gi/dynamic/...

Answer 3

they don't exist headphones can only be 2.0