Tag: Gaming

Ten Changes to Get the Most Out of Your Lenovo Legion Go

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I have learned so much about the Lenovo Legion Go handheld gaming PC over my time owning and using one. I’ve gone to great lengths to tune mine for everyday couch and mobile gaming. It has all my games installed and ready to go. It’s stable, games and power can be suspended and resumed mid play for convenience. Everything runs screaming fast and looks fantastic. Games and media sound so good, too!

Read on to discover the settings, tweaks, and modifications that I’ve used to get the most out of my Go. You won’t believe the difference these settings can make in your experience. As a bonus, most of them are free and easy.

  1. Sound
  2. Update Everything
  3. Touch Screen
  4. Floating Keyboard
  5. Hibernation Is Better
  6. Controllers and Buttons
  7. GPU Upscaling
  8. BIOS/UEFI Tweaks
  9. Optimize Windows 11 for Gaming
  10. SSD Swap

Sound

The first pain point with my precious handheld gaming PC. The speakers are subpar. Left at their default settings, they are high-pitched and struggle with power. Much of the potential volume is lost due to the speaker ports being on the top edge and angled away. Hold your hands up like rabbit ears behind the mesh while watching a video. You’ll be shocked by how much sound the speakers are really pumping out.

If you research the topic of poor sound, you’ll see there are several software workarounds that help considerably. The easy/free method is to use the Realtek Audio Console. Open it from the Start Menu to toggle off a feature called the “Omni Speaker”. Then use the same software to adjust the equalizer frequencies. Find this idea and lots of others at: https://www.reddit.com/r/LegionGo/

I used the equalizer changes above in conjunction with an app I already owned. Dolby Access is a Windows Store App that applies a Dolby Atmos surround sound effect to your PC’s sound system. The Go’s speakers sound so much better with the effect enabled. The dimensional soundscape achieved by applying some cheap software is surprising.

Dolby Access has a free demo. It costs $15 in the Microsoft App store.

Dolby’s magic app features a gaming performance mode that increases the accuracy of sound location. This is especially important in competitive games. It works well. I don’t fully understand how they trick your hearing so well. Things that are supposed to be behind you, sound like it.

For Dolby Access, or any spatial sound app to be the most effective, disable Window’s sound enhancements. Go to Settings -> System -> Sound and click on the speakers. Advanced -> Audio enhancements toggle off.

If you don’t have or want to purchase Dolby Access, there are some open-source options out there. I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ve seen FXSound mentioned several times while doing my research. It gets a lot of recommendations and positive reviews and is donation-ware.

Update Everything

The Legion Go is a complex machine. Especially its software layer. The sheer number of places you must check for updates is astonishing. Here’s a rundown of everywhere you need to check. I try to do this at least once a week.

  • Windows Update
    • Accessed by going to Settings -> Windows Update
    • I like to open the advanced options and flip on the toggle to receive updates for all Microsoft products.
  • Microsoft App (MSIX packages) Updates
    • Open the Microsoft Store App (shopping bag icon in start menu). Then click on Downloads (menu on left) from there click the Get Updates.
  • Legion Space
    • Disks and Drivers. Open Legion Space ->Settings -> Scroll down -> Disks and Drivers -> Check for Updates.
    • Controller Firmware Updates. Go to Controllers in the menu, scroll the bottom menu left to More. Scroll to the bottom of More page and click the Controller Firmware Update button.
  • App Updates.
    • Game Launchers. Steam, Xbox, Ubisoft, and EA Desktop, all have client updates in each app’s settings menu
    • Game updates. Each game gets its own updates (usually handled by the launchers).
    • Other software.
      • Example: The emulator app Dolphin needs updated frequently.

Touch Screen

One quality of life upgrade was realized just by changing my bad habit of touching the screen too much. I had been using the touch screen to enter my PIN and to scroll. This was making my screen filthy. Every time I picked up the little machine to play something, it was covered in fingerprints and smudges.

There were two changes I made to drastically reduce how often I had to clean the screen. First, at the PIN prompt you can usually click the A button to get the on-screen number pad to open. Then you can use the buttons, D-pad, shoulders, and triggers to enter your PIN code just like on an Xbox.

Using the scroll wheel reduces fingerprints.
Tapping and holding on the touch pad activates the right-click menu.

Second, the little wheel on the upper rear nook of the right controller is for scrolling. It works better and is more comfortable than touching the screen in most situations. The only trick is to remember that it’s back there.

Floating Keyboard

The OSK (On-Screen Keyboard) is huge the first time you try and enter text with it. It takes up the entire bottom half of the screen. This makes entering information into forms very difficult. The form either gets cut in half or squished to an illegible size when the keyboard opens. It’s a good thing there’s a built-in solution. You can resize and float the OSK in Windows.

Open the keyboard by touching or clicking the icon for it near the clock on your taskbar. Click or tap on the settings gear in the upper left corner of the keyboard’s panel. Then select Keyboard Layout from the menu and click small. Now you can use the little dash at the top of the OSK to drag it out of your way!

The small floating keyboard layout is easy to drag at of your way. Clicking Size and theme in the Keyboard’s settings will let you change its color size, and key size.

Hibernation Is Better

Batteries suck, but we’re stuck with them until some genius invents something else. For some unknown reason, the Go drains its battery in just a few hours of sleep mode. Do yourself a solid and change the power button’s function to hibernate instead of sleep.

There are two benefits hibernation has over sleep mode. The first is that your battery won’t be dead the next time you pick it up. Hibernation uses a lot less power over time than sleeping does.

The hibernation process exports everything in the computer’s memory to a save file on the hard drive. Then it powers down the RAM chips. This reduces power consumption. It also gives us our other benefit.

Go to Settings-> System-> Power & Battery to change what the power button does.

Everything running in RAM is saved to a file. This includes any game that is actively playing or paused when you pressed the power button. The LeGo can stay in hibernation for days with your game perfectly suspended in time.

The process takes a few seconds at most. In my opinion, hibernation makes the device more usable in real life situations. I play on my lunch break at work. Hibernating when my break is over means my battery and game will be ready to resume on the next day. You usually can’t do that with sleep mode.

Controllers and Buttons

The controllers on the Legion Go are a work of art. They are well constructed, feel great, and are tuned for a light touch. They disconnect from the main chassis like the Nintendo Switch’s do.

The placement of the menu and view buttons near the bottom of the left controller is a problem though. Those buttons are used in games heavily and stretching your thumb down to click them gets old. Especially in a game like Destiny 2 where you constantly need access to the character menu and maps.

There is an option to swap their functions with the Legion Space and Quick Control menu buttons. Open Legion Space and go to Controllers, then scroll to More. Scroll down the page and flip the toggle to swap the buttons.

Your thumbs will thank you for flipping this toggle on.

My other tip about the controllers is to take the time and map the back buttons. I tie them to crouch/slide, melee, reload, and jump in almost every FPS game that I play. Back buttons allow you to keep both thumbs on the sticks while performing button actions. This can be a big advantage in some games.

To map them, open Legion Space. Go to Controllers in the top menu then click the Button Mapping button in the list at the bottom. Now click the top View/Edit Layout button. Finally, click the Rear-View choice at the bottom of the screen. Click on each button to pull up the mapping menu for it.

GPU Upscaling

There are lots of tweaks and changes you can make to boost the performance of your Go in various games. One of the most potent is to setup the various upscale options for both on your GO and in your games. The Legion Go supports AMD’s Radeon Super Resolution and their FidelityFX (FSR 3) technologies. Taking advantage of them reduces the load on your GPU which usually translates to an increased frame rate.

AAA titles can run in the 60-110 FPS range with good fidelity once you learn to tune and upscale them. I haven’t written a comprehensive guide to upscale games yet, but the basics are easy. Open the AMD Adrenaline app and turn on the scaling options.

There’s also a switch for RSR in the Legion quick menu.

The details of scaling are a rabbit hole of advanced tweaks and changes. Things like algorithms, game resolution options, post-processing settings, and sharpening effects can alter your experience. YouTube and the sub-Reddit mentioned above are good places to start building knowledge if you want to go deep.

GPU scaling options are dependent on driver and software versions. If you don’t see the options, make sure your software is all updated.

Learning to upscale and tweak your games is probably the most impactful performance boost you can get on this system. If you’re not already familiar with scaling, try using 1600X1200 @ 144Hz as your display resolution. Then run your games at 800X600. If you can’t set the game’s resolution to 800×600, change the resolution scale to 50%. It amounts to the same thing.

If you are less than impressed with AMD’s GPU scaling abilities, there are also other options available. While doing research, I noticed that lots of people are mentioning the Steam App Lossless Scaling as a great alternate. The app is $6.99 in the Steam store: https://store.steampowered.com/app/993090/Lossless_Scaling/

BIOS/UEFI Tweaks

In the Legion Go’s BIOS there are two settings we can adjust that effect game performance. The first is how much of the system’s 16 Gigabytes of RAM is reserved to support the GPU. By default, 3 GB of VRAM is selected but this can slow some games down. I get better performance and game stability with 4 GB assigned to graphics processing. That leaves 12 GB for Windows and your game, which is plenty in most cases.

Shutdown -> Hold Power + Volume Up
Overclock the RAM
Reserve 4GB VRAM

You can also overclock the RAM for an overall performance boost. Increasing the RAM’s speed will cause it to generate more heat. Excessive heat can impact CPU and GPU throttling. Consider the environment you play in.

Before you make either change, verify you are on the newest version of the system firmware. You Boot to the UEFI control screen to make these changes by shutting down first. Then hold down the Power and Volume up buttons at the same time for a few seconds.

Optimize Windows 11 for Gaming

The Legion Go is running Windows 11 Home. The default security posture of Windows 11 is not optimized for gaming. Specifically, memory integrity and the Virtual Machine Platform features of Windows 11 can slow down some games.

Turning these features off is a personal choice. You are technically weakening the operating system’s security by doing so. Review Microsoft’s documentation for an explanation and the instructions at: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/options-to-optimize-gaming-performance-in-windows-11-a255f612-2949-4373-a566-ff6f3f474613

I like to PIN my games to Start. Go to Settings -> Personalization -> Start -> and select the option for more PINs if you do too.

Make folders on the Start Menu. Dragging one icon onto another. Drag and drop icons as needed to add. Rename a folder by clicking into it. Right click on folders in the start menu to move them left or right.

Maximize the task bar space. Settings -> Personalization -> Taskbar:
Search -> Icon.
Disable Task View.
Disable Widgets.

On my Legion Go, I disable most of the start-up apps. It helps conserve CPU cycles, RAM, and disk I/O for the games. Go to Settings-> Apps -> Startup. I only leave three apps toggled on. The Radeon Software Startup Task, Realtek HD Audio Universal Service, and the Windows Security notification icon.

SSD Swap

I replaced the factory storage with a much faster and higher-capacity unit from Corsair. The upgrade has had a major impact on daily life with the LeGo. Downloads, and loading times are much faster. I can store my entire active catalog of games. Everything feels snappy. Read I SSD Swapped My Lenovo Legion Go. It Was Worth It for the details and instructions. 

Installing faster high high-capacity storage is a great upgrade.

The Legion Go is an excellent gaming computer right out of the box. Tweaks, changes, and upgrades like the ones above help make it even better. I use mine more than any other gaming system and that’s saying something.

Fix For Intel i225-V Ethernet Controller Dropping Connections with Event ID 27 e2fnexpress

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For the last several months I’ve noticed that my Ethernet (wired) network connection will drop unexpectedly. Of course, it does this at the most inconvenient times. It dropped in one of the best Halo matches I’ve had in a while. One minute I was slaying with the Ghost on my way to a Killtrocity, and a Steaktacular team win. Next thing I know, I was staring at the “You’ve been disconnected” banner.

I’ve been meaning to dig in and see what could be done about the issue for a while now. Unfortunately, I’ve been distracted due to dealing with my CPU issues. You can read about that saga in Intel i-9 CPU Issues: From Failures to Fixes , good times. Getting booted out of that Halo match was the last straw though.

The first diagnostics tool I looked at was the Windows System Event Log. If you are having similar issues and are trying to follow along type “Event” into your Windows search bar. Open the app it finds and look under Windows Logs, then System to see the section I am referring to.

The Windows System Event Log is a great place to start when you think hardware might be causing your problem.

After I found the event 27 and read its description, “Network link is disconnected” I considered the situation. I had not unplugged my network cable, and I know my network is pretty solid. So rather than go down the network troubleshooting route, I decided to try a clean install of the driver.

This Intel Support Article for troubleshooting dropped connections contains a link to another set of instructions. They’re for preforming a clean driver installation, here is a direct link: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000058304/ethernet-products.html . Following those steps was easy enough, but there wasn’t a link to the driver’s download page. I had to search for them. At the time of this writing, they are available here for modern Windows versions.

Once the zip file downloads, extract its contents (right click and choose extract). Then open the extracted folder and double click SetupBD.exe (image above) to start the new driver installation. Make sure that you have followed the Intel instructions to remove the old driver first. Click yes if you are prompted for administrator rights. Then click the OK button to start the installation.

The drivers only take a second to install. I suggest that you reboot your computer even though the installation doesn’t require it. I noticed that my original driver from 10/08/2023 stayed loaded in the device manager until I rebooted. The date changes to 2/20/24.

What I find most interesting is that I run the Intel Driver Support Assistant agent on my machine. It checks for Intel updates continuously. I also run MSI Center at startup and have it configured to install all updates. Windows Update is set to check for and install driver updates too. At no time did any of these tools recommend or install an updated driver for the wired network card.

Anyway, this probably isn’t a universal fix for all the network problems people have with this particular card. The Intel support document in the link above has several more “workarounds” for other various issues. So far, the clean install of the new driver seems to have fixed my issue. I haven’t randomly dropped since I completed the procedure and rebooted. It’s too early to call it 100%, I’ll update the post if it happens again.

Intel i-9 CPU Issues: From Failures to Fixes

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Where to start this months long saga? Initially, my i-9 and MSI MAG z790 Tomahawk WiFi motherboard seemed to be a big upgrade. Unfortunately, it wasn’t long until some games and apps would completely crash my system to a powered off state. There was a fairly low occurrence rate when the issue started, but it happened more over time.

I checked everything multiple times. I disassembled and rebuilt my entire PC and completely reinstalled everything. I reset and updated my motherboard’s firmware. Nothing helped. The games still crashed. I decided that my AIO cooler’s internals must have failed. I replaced it with an Arctic Liquid Freezer III. Sadly, the crashes continued, and they were getting worse by the day.

Rumors started in the MSI forums. They said that the 13th and 14th Gen i-7 and i-9 CPUs were susceptible to flaws in their original microcode. Microcode is logic software that directs traffic inside the processor. The flaw caused the processor to draw too much power during heavy loads. That overdraw causes the shutdown.

It took Intel a long time to publicly acknowledged the flaw. They also said that the situation could permanently damage the chips. By the time they had made the announcement, my system wouldn’t even boot anymore. It just flashed the CPU error light after powering up. I worked with Intel Tech support. They determined that my Raptor Lake i-9 was damaged. It needed to be replaced. So, I RMA’d it (Return to Manufacturing) for a refund.

I chose the refund option because Intel was already out of stock on replacement CPUs. The process of getting the RMA was time consuming. I had to provide a full tech support ticket on their site at: https://supporttickets.intel.com/ then I worked with the assigned tech to troubleshoot. We finished the diagnostics. I removed the CPU from my system. I then boxed it up and sent it to Intel.

I submitted my warranty request to Intel on 8/17/2024 and shipped the CPU to them via UPS the next morning. I received my refund via Western Union on 10/8/2024. They are extremely backlogged to say the least. Intel needs to examine each CPU. To issue a refund, they must find it faulty due to the microcode problem, not some other issue. That is where the time went, waiting for a diagnostics technician to examine the chip. Intel support was extremely professional and kept me updated with regular emails.

I used the refund to purchase another i-9 from Microcenter.com after Intel thought they had fixed the issue with a microcode update. I downloaded the 0x129 microcode update on my laptop. I also downloaded the newest firmware for my motherboard from MSI’s site. Then, I transferred them to a thumb drive. I used the thumb drive to flash the motherboard and install the new microcode, again.

By this time, I have lost count of how many times I’ve performed a firmware flash on my system. It has to be more than ten. The 0x129 update corrected the issue in some games but not in others. The games that most reliably caused me a crash were Battlefield 2042, Doom Eternal, and Starfield. The system also suffered frame drops and fuzz outs in Halo, CoD MWIII, and Assetto Corsa. These issues seemed to also be caused by the P-cores thermally throttling themselves.

I wanted to continue playing the games that were triggering the shutdown. To protect the system from damage, I detuned the CPU via the motherboard’s overclocking options. My goal was to keep the power draw as low as possible and still maintain decent performance.

Many of the options in UEFI for an Intel processor make only a slight difference in actual game performance. The trick is knowing which ones to adjust and which to leave alone. Refer to your motherboard manufacturer’s documentation for information on the settings.

I ran an analysis with the classic tuner’s app HwInfo. I deduced that CPU temps were still spiking past the threshold in certain games. This was initiating the Emergency Shutdown function. This was a disappointing discovery, to say the least. At least the shutdown was kicking in right at 100c (Intel’s suggested limits) so it shouldn’t be damaging.

To get this type of information in HwInfo, you need to open sensor mode and start logging. When your system crashes, open the file it was writing. You will be able to see the status of all your components at the time of the shutdown.

To Start an HwInfo log file, click the Sensors button and then click the Start Logging button in the Sensors window.
The red box highlights the microcode version of the CPU. 12B is the newest update available at the time of this writing.

After reading various posts in the MSI and Intel forums, I decided to turn off the “Intel® Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0” function. I also manually set my P-Core ratios to 56 to slow the physical cores down to 5.6 gigahertz. These two changed fixed the remaining problems, but I wasn’t getting the performance I had paid for this running way. I tested each game for about an hour while running full monitoring, which itself causes a CPU load. The cores stayed well under the 100c threshold.

Two weeks later, Intel announced another microcode issue in the Raptor Lake processor. This new issue was causing a Vmin Shift Instability in certain situations. Later that same day, Intel and MSI released microcode update 0x12B. Which was supposed to be the final fix.

Once again, I ran through the flash process. I noticed that the Motherboard’s UEFI BIOS now prompts me with options on its boot screen. I can choose either Intel Defaults, MSI Safe, or MSI Performance profiles. I chose Intel defaults and verified that it undid the P-core and Turbo customizations that I had made earlier.

Thankfully 0x12B seems to have done the trick. I’m able to run my system at its maximum performance for up to two hours. I’m sure it can go indefinitely; the temperatures never get much above 85c now. I don’t’ really notice any performance degradation in the games I play after the update. The system performs better than it did while it was detuned, that’s for sure. It’s been quite the PC gamer adventure dealing with this mess. I’m glad it worked out in the end.

How I Diagnosed and Fixed a Lian-Li L-Connect 3 Fan Speed and RGB Control Failure After Updates

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Many motherboard manufacturers are including RGB controllers on their wares now. MSI’s version is called Mystic Light, the control software runs as an add-on to the Motherboard’s MSI Center console. There are numerous PC hardware manufacturers. Custom PC builders frequently use components from each. For example, my motherboard is from MSI, but my power supply is made by Corsair.

The market situation and custom build scenes have led to a series of API’s being included in the various manufacturer’s software so that control bridges could be established. On my system, this allows MSI Center and it’s Mystic Light add-on to control the lighting connected directly to the motherboard along with my Lian-Li Galahad 360, and SL fans which are connected to a Lian-Li control box.

In my setup, I use Mystic Light to control all the RGB, but control the fans via L-Connect. The Lian Li software’s cooling options and programable curves are much more precise than those offered by MSI Center.

In a recent Windows update, Microsoft has also added its own take on a universal light controller protocol and software package they’re calling Dynamic Lighting. The option can be found under Settings and then under Personalization. Microsoft’s entry into the space seems to have spurred manufactures to update their software and firmware to either gain or block compatibility depending on their particular market strategy.

These are the default Microsoft Dynamic Lighting settings on my systems. In this configuration, MSI Center and L-Connect remain in control.

I use Logitech accessories. Their controller software, G-Hub, updated and added Dynamic Lighting compatibility. MSI Center’s Mystic Light add-on updated but does not seem to have gained any options in the Dynamic Lighting control screen. One of the three updates broke the Lian Li L-Connect software on my system. I am unable to tell which one for sure because they all applied around the same time. Read on to see how I found and fixed the issue.

You can turn Windows Dynamic Lighting on/off for individual G-Hub devices.
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Now You Can Experience Cyberpunk 2077 in PC VR with A Free Mod

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Cyberpunk 2077’s Night City seems like it would be a perfect location to hang out in using virtual reality. In-fact, the whole game looks like it would be fantastic in 3D at a realistic scale. I bet the futuristic theme would also lend itself well to the immersive nature of VR.

Luckily, there are few ways to get the PC version of the game to play using main-stream virtual reality headsets. Luke Ross’s REAL VR mod is one popular method. I’ve decided to experiment with the free option from the people that make VORP X.

VORP X is a well-known piece of software that enables many PC games to be played in VR even if they don’t natively support it. If you don’t already know about them, check out their site @:https://www.vorpx.com/. The team at VORP X has made a standalone mod for Cyberpunk 2077 and that is what I’ll be working with throughout this article.

According to everything that I’ve read on the subject, you’ll need a very powerful gaming PC to have a satisfactory play experience using this method. I’m running a 4090, Intel 12700K, 980 Pros, and 32GB of DDR4. The headset I’m using is a Meta Quest 3.

To install the VR mod, download it from the VORP X download page. Then right click on the downloaded file and choose the option to Extract All. Double click on the extracted CyberpunkVR_Setup.exe to start the installation.

You may be prompted that an unknown application is requesting to make changes to your system. This prompt is generated because the alpha code we are downloading from VORP X is not properly signed by a publicly certified certificate.

Proceed at your own risk. If you want to use the VR mod. the only choice is to click yes and/or allow. There can be more than one prompt depending on the security configuration of your gaming PC and network.

After the prompt, you will need to locate the installation files for Cyberpunk 2077. The installer attempts to find them for you and was successful in my case. If it doesn’t locate yours use the “manage files” function of the launcher to see the path.

When you locate the install folder and click ok, there will be a message to tell you that the mod does not support motion controls (it does some now). Select yes, then click the next button. Accept the license agreement and then click Next. Finally click Install.

To play Cyberpunk in VR, put on your headset and enable Oculus Link (Air and Cable link both work). Once you are in the Oculus Desktop environment, show the game library (click the library button on the tool bar) and you should see Cyberpunk 2077 as an available title. Point at it and press A to start the game.

You can use the Quest controllers along with some basic gestures for aiming down site and using your sword, among others, but there really aren’t enough buttons to get the job done. I preferred using my Xbox controller paired to my PC to play. A tutorial explaining the controls is displayed every time you start the game. Press the A button on your controller to skip it.

The world is presented in 3D VR but appears almost like it is on a giant wall-sized curved monitor that you are standing really close to. If you turn your head to quickly, the tracking fails to keep up and you see the edges of the display. Don’t get me wrong the effect is functional and the game plays fine this way, it just isn’t a typical VR AAA experience. What do you expect for free?

I was able to achieve a stable frame rate with good looking graphics running on high with ray tracing disabled. I was averaging right at seventy frames per second with this config, but I expect anyone playing on a system with a less powerful GPU will need to turn down graphics options in the game’s settings menu, first thing. Or risk being made nauseous.

Overall, it was fun to see Night City at scale and in 3D. The people watching in down-town alone is worth the thirty minutes of effort and zero dollars it took to make this work. I don’t think VR will be anyone’s primary play mode just yet, but you can tell the Devs are serious about getting there.

The Asus ROG Ally and Bose QC Ultra Earbuds Are Made for Each Other

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I have written several articles about the ROG Ally and its abilities. The Nintendo Switch sized gaming PC makes playing on the couch, in bed, or on the go a comfortable and fun experience. It is the device I play on most because of its combination of portability and performance.

I recently upgraded my earbuds to the new Bose Quiet Comfort Ultras. ANC earbuds make it easy to escape the noises of the world when you want to. As one might expect, the Bose active nose canceling feature of their flagship earbuds is exceptional. While they cannot achieve total silence in loud environments, they certainly make almost any noise tolerable.

The new QC Ultras are smaller and lighter than previous Quiet Comfort earbuds. They also feature a a new method to achieve a secure comfortable fit. I find the new tips and fins to be a welcome upgrade over my original QC earbuds. The Ultras stay in my ears while walking, running, and while I’m chewing, or talking. So far, they don’t seem to leave sore spots where they make contact.

The pointed fin tips on the old style frequently made my ears sore where they touched.
The original QC earbuds are the black ones.

My favorite feature is the immersive audio. The QC Ultras use Bose magic to make any type of audio source sound like you are listening to it on a hi-fi stereo speaker setup and sitting right in the sweet spot. When I first read about the function, I was skeptical. Now that I’ve experienced it for myself, I am impressed. The wide sound stage and auto ANC combine to great effect.

The most important reason for me upgrading to the new earbuds was their low latency support. I have struggled to play games with BT headphones and earbuds since the beginning. I just can’t get over the audio lag that almost all of them suffer from.

Pulling the trigger to take a shot and not hearing the sound until after the next round is chambered, is distracting. Hearing footsteps coming up behind you, knowing it is too late to do anything about them is frustrating. Watching cutscenes that play like old voiced-over karate films is annoying.

The QC Ultra earbuds completely solve these issues. When paired with my phone there is no detectable lag in any of the games I have tested so far. There’s also no lag in video streams or video calls, people’s lip movements and sounds stay in sync on both.

This lack of lag on my phone got me wondering what the performance would be like if I paired the earbuds with my Ally. It has literally been years since I’ve bothered using Bluetooth audio with a PC for anything but Teams and Zoom. The lag was just insufferable.

I was pleased to discover that I could not detect any lag while playing PC games with the Ultra earbuds. I tried several modern and older games along with a couple of emulators, and they all worked perfectly. The earbud’s mics were great for game chat, too.

I have the Dolby Atmos for Headphones, DTS for Headphones, and Windows Sonic for headphones, audio apps for Windows. All of the virtual surround sound drivers worked with the QC Ultras and did not introduce any detectable lag.

Dolby Atoms is a licensed app you can purchase from the Microsoft Store. It is not included with the earbuds.

I’ve paired the QC Ultra Earbuds with my wife’s Steam Deck and I’ve also paired them with my Meta Quest 3. I got fantastic results with both. The Bose Music app for your phone lets you add multiple devices and switch between them, but they only connect to one thing at a time.

I upgraded to get a better experience from the advertised low latency. Bose delivered on that promise. Audio sites are giving the new earbuds high marks overall, subtracting a few points due to the lack of multi-point and wireless charging. If you’ve been looking for BT earbuds specifically for gaming, I’m not sure you can do better right now.