A mixed bag (X-Rocker Gaming Chair)

Member Name: Grummy

Product:	X-Rocker Gaming Chair
Date:	13/08/09 (314 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good sound and comfort when you are using it for a short period

Disadvantages: Uncomfortable and temperamental on extended use

I bought one of these chairs last year at the same time as buying myself a nice new HD TV. We'd recently moved house and I wanted to use the small room as a gaming room for myself, so we went out and spent copious amounts of money on different pieces of technology for the house, and this chair was what I though was going to be the final piece of the puzzle.

Well it was, its just the wrong puzzle.

You see, as good as this chair is, and it IS good, it also has a number of negatives to it.

I'll start with what's good.

The height of the chair is perfect for a good gaming set up, neither too high or too low, perfect eye level. The quality of audio output is also excellent. Perhaps not perfect by any means, but not bad either. It also genuinely does rock back and forth, which is nice. And its comfortable, for the most part.

But that really is it for the good. Now for the bad.

On the flip side of the comfort issue, whilst its good for short burst of gaming, an hour here or there, if you're settling down for an extended evening of gaming then after a few hours the thing becomes damn uncomfortable. 'Numb bum' syndrome is guaranteed.
As it has speakers built in, there is an electrical current running through it, and if used for extensive periods of time, the chair gets uncomfartably warm, and it can heat a room up quite extensively. So be sure to plenty of airflow, especially in the summer months as it can get damn hot. Worse, if it IS hot, and you change into shorts, if you are on the chair for any length of time, the heat emanating WILL make your legs and backside sweat, and your skin will stick to the chair, making getting off the thing quite painful for a moment and ultimately bloody uncomfortable.

With records to the audio, the sockets for plugging in your wires can become lose, and the audio, though in and of itself excellent, can take a few minutes to work, of resulting in a frenzied couple of minutes as you attempt to find the right angle for the wire then have it held in place.

Speaking of the wires, you need to make sure you prepare them so they are the perfect length and are able to run away from the chair without risk of getting caught, because this chair can and WILL catch your audio wires if you don't prepare leading to split wires, extra expense and inconveniance as you have to constantly replace them. So If you are buying this, be aware of that.


Truth to tell, this chair isn't any worse than any of the others available, I've got friends who have other ones and they tell me that they have similar issues with theirs. It is more a matter of the type of product in general being flawed, than this particular one being a problem. This chair isn't an excepetion, rahter just another example of what appears to be the rule for this general product.

With that in mind, if you still wish to buy one of these chairs, you could do much worse. This is well priced compared to others, I paid around £90 for mine from Argos, which was the second cheapest at the time. The sound, when it works properly is quite excellent, and for short burst gaming it is perfectly comfortable.

So whilst, overall I rate this quite low, when compared to other chairs of this type, it actually fairs quite well.

Summary: Good for limited use, bad for lengthy gaming sessions