Since Jan this year, I’ve tried 4 Oticon IIC/CIC and 1 Widex mini CIC. They had horrible physical fit and/or gain. I was thinking I had a messed up ear and my audiogram was too strange. Was giving up but my audiologist somehow didn’t give up on me and suggested to try another.
This time I have Phonak CIC and it’s fine out of the box! There is no physical pain, my ear isn’t red and angry, the mold is nice and smooth, it doesn’t poke out my outer ear, and it doesn’t fall out. They were able to put a nice big vent hole in it; I have small ear and the other ones were only able to put a tiny vent hole (some even looked like a joke as if someone just manually skived a tiny hole).
The gain setting out of the box, after calibrating with their software, works; I didn’t scream that it was too loud! We had to manually set the others lower than the lowest setting. The best part is the included MiniControl; this is extremely helpful at this initial stage that I can tap and lower the gain a tiny bit on my own.
This Phonak is the dumbest one compared to the others but that’s exactly what I was looking for; hopefully there isn’t extra processing built in as we couldn’t find anything to turn off. Sadly, the Oticons sound significantly better; it was beautiful. This Phonak is very blah sounding and sometimes sounds really strange - e.g. clapping has a bit metallic sound (?!).
All aids were at the same price point at either the lowest or second lowest tier.
The accessory dept needs help though. Battery door isn’t snappy. No cleaning or battery removal tool. After only a few days, the case doesn’t close all the way. I’ll use the accessories from the duds.
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