My Phonaks have gone a bit wrong with the right ear now much quieter than the left and sometimes missing completely, despite showing on the app. Luckily, I have to go back to the audiologist on Tuesday so hopefully it will be fixed.
The default automatic setting simply makes S sounds more prominent, so wouldnât normally justify the cost. I have the default music setting plus four others that progressively boost the default. I have quite enjoyed all of these. The top end is noticeably brighter and a little louder and the overall effect is quite pleasing.
I think Iâm hearing the tish or pish of the cymbals but not the the shimmer because sits 4-6kHz. The Phonaks havenât really fixed this and I suspect that is lost to me.
Music on my system does sound fantastic but itâs producing sounds that canât hear or canât hear properly. I guess I have to accept that in the same way that Iâm not bothered by being colour blind. Just enjoy the music as it is. I will persevere with the aids as they do make the things sound better and do sound gratifyingly natural (or they did before they went wrong).
One reason for this thread was to explore the possibility that older forum members might benefit from experimenting with hearing aids with potentially greater benefit than than some other expensive solutions (so I was a little disappointed when @Richard.Dane moved it to the Lounge). For me, the jury is still out but I do think others might be impressed,
When I wrote my first, long, post about my partial hearing loss (about February 2021) I was amazed at the number of replies from members of this forum already using aids.
Thinking about it later it was fairly obvious that, with the average age of form members appearing (to me) to be 60 plus, there had to be a lot with hearing problems. Itâs a bit frustrating to continually see posts here from people who have spent thousands on Hi-Fi & then joke that âof courseâ their hearing is dreadful. I want to shout at them âFor goodness sake, do something about it instead of wasting yet more money on expensive Hi-Fi that they canât possibly be hearing to itsâ maximumâ. Their quality of life would probably be improved well beyond gaining more enjoyment from their Hi-Fi systems.
I hope Tuesday goes well for you & that, when all the initial hicups are sorted, you quickly start to feel real benefit from your aids.
Another visit to Specsavers happened. I got the moulds done for my ear defenders with the next visit scheduled for 25 October, just before the next gig (Dylan in Cardiff).
The aids were cleaned up and balance restored and the music settings given a boost. I attach a picture of the highest setting and Iâm wondering if @davidhendon has any thoughts?
The new and more experienced audiologist said there is still plenty of headroom to boost those pesky cymbals, if needed.
I donât know Phonak Target so I canât really interpret those curves very easily. But I think you can theoretically have the levels increased as long as you keep within the area below that grey cloud at the top, which represents the levels at which feedback and distortion limit what you can do.
If you are going to increase the treble a bit, then I suggest trying 3dB to start with. Thatâs doubling the power, so a significant amount, but not enough to cause problems as I understand those curves. If you go for more than that, you are probably going to get sibilance when itâs not cymbals, but a voice for example.
A rule of thumb is that 1dB is hard to detect unless you really listen carefully and know what you are hearing. 2dB should be fairly easily detectable and 3dB is starting to be significant.
So the area below the grey line is probably what is technically possible, not necessarily what is real world useful?
The new audiologist agreed that my hearing wouldnât normally require hearing aids but my musical needs justify them. I couldnât get her to clarify where am compared to typical 60+ year olds but she did say my lower frequency hearing good, possibly better than hers (and she looked about half my age).
I am beginning to think that a few older forum members might benefit from following my example. Better than fretting over switch power supplies, for example.
Notionally, perfect hearing is 0dB, but in reality itâs only when you get to about 20 or 30 dB loss that itâs going to be causing anyone any problems. I think your low frequency response is good for your age.
The high frequency loss is more of an issue and this is where you can start to find it difficult to distinguish between different consonants, particularly if spoken by a soft voiced woman. Context usually helps but not always.
And for music, losing that much high frequency response is going to make music sound flat and uninteresting. Usually with hearing aids you donât want to put back the whole loss because it is going to sound too much and anyway you are likely to run into dynamic range problems, where either or both of the hearing aid and your cochlear wonât be able to handle the loudest high frequency sounds. So the hearing aid uses compression to get over that and you want it to be working gently in the background and not having to conduct an emergency rescue operation on your hearing every time you get a loud bit of music!
The bottom of the grey cloud is the greatest gain it can do without feedback and distortion. I think the grey line in the middle is probably a best fit for compensating for your loss (but see what I said above and anyway I might be misinterpreting this graph as I donât know the Phonak Target fitting software). The coloured lines at the bottom are the gain being applied at different frequencies and sound levels and itâs just ticking over at the moment, so plenty of scope for increasing it if you want.
Are you using the Phonak smartphone app? Again I donât know it myself as I use GN Resound Aids and everything is different to Phonak. But I think you can increase the treble in the app (tone controls in fact!) and that could give you an idea of what you want the audiologist to do.
Really interesting. I think Iâm beginning to understand
The Phonak app allows volume adjustment but the audiologist told me thatâs not the same as the boosts the music setting gives me. There is a default automatic setting that is supposed to adjust to music, restaurant or TV, as required. You can also change equaliser settings from default to comfort, clarity, speech and surroundings. Finally, there are sliders for noise reduction, speech focus and dynamic. The default seems to be âcalm situationâ.
So the music setting I shared above looks like it boosts the 4-6kHz by around 12dB which Google tells me somewhere breathing and whispering, so not much? Not sure if you think the remaining headroom is 3dB or more because itâs only ticking over, a description I rather liked
The scale on the left (the y axis) is in dB. So you have a huge amount more if you want. Far more than 3dB!
You could play around with those settings in the app and see what you think. Itâs totally different to the app I have, so I canât really help much more.
The volume adjustment is just all frequencies, whereas what you are wanting is to boost the treble a bit more without altering all the other frequencies.
Maybe someone who uses Phonak can advise further on the app eg @Sloop_John_B
It can be confusing, but dB can be used as an absolute number. So if perfect silence is 0 then breathing might be 12dB higher. But forget about that now because itâs not relevant!
But it is also used to explain the amount of amplification. So looking back at your audiograms you posted a week ago or so, if you look on the y axis you will see the number of dBs that your high frequency response is below the mid range response. Itâs a lot more than 12dB loss at 6 kHz say. So getting the audiologist to boost the treble by another 3dB or more if you want is an easy thing to try.
The app is really pretty self-explanatory â there is a music program and you have two options more bass and more treble and then you can access a graphic equaliser to further attenuate or reduce bass mid or treble.
I thought of an analogy to explain this â12 dB is breathingâ thing.
You could say 5 mph is a brisk walk. But you could also be driving along at 40 mph or 50 mph and decide to drive 5 mph faster, so 45 or 55 mph. dB work the same way. The second 5 mph is nothing to do with walking. Your 12dB high frequency lift is nothing to do with whispering or breathing.
And the fact dB is logarithmic is irrelevant. Itâs because to make something sound twice as loud, you need more than twice the power. There is in fact a rough logarithmic relationship between sound power level and perceived loudness. Decibels just mean you can pretend itâs linear, so 5 dB more is the same increase in loudness however quiet or loud you are talking about.
Before the pedants pile in, I should say that itâs a lot more complicated than that and the perceived change in loudness depends on frequency and indeed absolute loudness as well as varying massively between individuals. Google Fletcher Munson curves if you want to know more.
All of this incidentally is why the total nonsense mouthed by some that you donât want tone controls because you want to hear it exactly like the sound engineer intended is so extraordinarily crass and uninformed. If you want to perceive a recording the way that the sound engineer intended then you definitely do need tone controls or equalisation, unless by pure chance your hearing, your loudspeakers and your room are exactly like the sound engineer expected.
Hi, and thank you for the contribution, I am in the process of making my mind up to finally use hearing aids although it is years that my audiologist and doctor prescribed them. Since youâre a bit ahead of me, can I ask which HA type/model/make did you settled on in the end?
I went for these. A few forum members have mentioned them and they were the instant recommendation of the audiologist, based on my music listening requirements.
I personally settled on Starkey Evolv AI RIC ( receiver in canal ) which I found to be very comfortable after a while (all hearing aids take a little getting used to as they unlike IEMs are in your ear canal for probably 12 hours of your day).
I purchased the 2nd best model of which funds allowed and were battery type which last about 6/7 days at 12 hours use per day.
They are very unobtrusive to the extent a friend of mine asked when I was getting my aids to which I replied I was wearing them now and he was sitting right next to me!.
They are programmable and have customised setting which you can adjust to suit your music needs.By the way I am still in the process of fine tuning the main settings with my audiologist over the next month or two and intend to incorporate a headphone program as well as one that will suit my Atom HE /NAP200/Neat Iota Alphas.
Hope this helps
Well Keith, these are of the same make as a friend of mine uses, although he has the Paradise Marvel 70-R. I must admit that this hearing aid stuff has me panicking a bit, but reading comments like yours makes me want to try.
