Well sort of glad I did the RMA now...
Just to provide some feedback to the issues I had on my headset. Background **** I normally use the Sennheiser GAME ONE for the past few years, but was looking to get back into true 7.1 for FPS on my gamer after it had matured more over the years. (My last true 7.1was from turtle beach when they first come out years ago, and it broke in one ear for one of the channels just after warranty ended.) The Sennheiser HMD 280 was my first headset from them and I have not been disappointed yet. ****
Running windows 7 x64 enterprise with the latest version of the software and firmware as of 8/25/2017. Run tests on it connected to USB 2.0 and 3.0 with no changes.
If I left all of the settings on the right turned to off and just adjusted the levels of the individual speaker groups the headset sounded pretty darn good.
Tried the below settings from the recommendation:
60-80% microphone volume is most optimized with this microphone
ENC enabled
Noise gate adjusted to the second bar from the bottom
Perfect voice off
Voice clarity at 100%
Compressor levels using default levels (communication profile)
The ENC, Noise Gate, and the Microphone volume did not cause issues with the audio, but once I started messing with compression and voice clarity for some reason the game audio from the speakers became tinny and not a pleasure to hear. Multiple games (Factorio, WOWS, Borderlands 1&2, and BF1) It did not matter if I rebooted my computer or not, it was still tinny, so turned both of those off.
I also tried some of the ideals from the other post and still nothing. It sounded like if I changed anything on the settings on the right it messed with the audio I was getting from the headset. It is like the software needs to be modified so that any settings you change need only change the speakers and then have another tab or section for just changes to the mic and not the audio.
Will send a PM so that I am notified once the stock has been updated to try one more time.
