Yes, I agree with your point Samuel - HA music can be good if not perfect. But ‘musical layers’ are indeed an issue: pop okay, jazz from any era, solos all fine. But if it’s 40 orchestral musicians, or a choir, or worse still both together, then the jumbling begins. Not my ears, because those all sound fine on equalised heaphones without HA.
The culprit must be the digitisation, presumably too coarse for clean tonal detail.
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I am stone deaf in one ear, so I do all my listening with my one ear. It’s the best I can do.
I bought my “phonak paradise” hearing aid from Costco as their KS10, and got their acrylic ear mold and standard RIC for $40. But when I saw the Dr. Cliff video on the Phonak ActiveVent, I wanted to see if it could be fitted to my KS10 HA; yes, it could be done. I went to an audiologist to buy the ActiveVent and titanium ear mold from Phonak. $450 for the mold and receiver and fitting/programming. For a week I was ecstatic.
I have ActiveVent receiver and when it worked correctly, I too found sound while streaming was comparable to my Sony WF1000XM4 earbud. It is clear that the quality and frequency range of the ActiveVent receiver is far superior to the standard cheapo receivers most of us are fitted with.
Alas, that seems to have gone away after a week or two, when I first got them, then, even after 4 new earmolds being made by Phonak, I never got that sound back. It’s as if the ActiveVent is never sealing the vent now, so sound is tinny and thin, like an old time transister radio. Nothing I do seems to seal the ear. None of the remade molds they made made any difference. That I was teased with how good the bass could sound for those first week or two is keeping me on an endless quest for a solution. I even contacted Dr. Cliff and spoke to his wife who told me that Dr Cliff had almost no experience with ActiveVent receivers, had not actually fitted one himself at all. And she told me that most audiologists are not using them because they have so many problems. Wish he’d said that in his video praising the ActiveVent which is still up on YouTube.
I’ve even switched back to the $40 Costco mold and receiver.
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I too stream from my Windows 10 PC to my KS10 HA with BT. In the system tray, there is a speaker icon, allowing you to change volume and which output device is active. I found 2 different HA options, one works much better than the other. I’m sure that one is LE and one is Classic BT although they are not so labeled on the setting. The LE option causes intermittent skipping every 1-2 seconds. The other Classic provides a more steady BT connection and works fine.
Maybe your ActiveVent is faulty and needs replacement? My titanium ear molds and ActiveVents are still providing excellent sound quality since last April 2023.
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al11, you turned out to be totally correct. Today I visited a new audi who had fitted an ActiveVent for a patient who has been wearing it for a couple of years now and no complaints., She had a pair of ActiveVent receivers in her office. She offered to allow me to come in and test her receivers to see if they worked for music to give me decent bass. Soon as I put it in my ear, and turned on Samsung Music to play a Fleetwood Mac song I had cued up, it was instantly clear that this was the effect I was searching for. Since my original ActiveVent receiver was out of warranty (they only give 6 months instead of 3 yrs like all the other receivers and HAs) I paid $150 for the new receiver and was out the door, grateful that I was able to afford that $150. The new receiver makes a huge difference in my music streaming; now it’s comparable to good quality earbuds, not like a old time transister radio.
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So nice to see that you now are satisfied. Glad I could help.
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Well, I have to tell myself, ‘Not so fast, Michael.’ I have been using the temp silicone eartip since I don’t have any more grommets to hold the ActiveVent in the titanium earmold, and I happened to try my old ActiveVent receiver in the silicone temp tip, and it works as good as the new one. I find that if I just touch the tragus* and nudge it into the ear just a little bit, I get the full bass sound I’ve been looking for. That must complete the seal that has been lacking. This suggests to me that I need a better fitting earmold, not a new ActiveVent. Back to the Audi for another consult.
*(The tragus is a triangular flap of cartilage that partially covers the concha, a space in the center of the auricle. The auricle is the visible part of the ear that is outside the head. It is also called the pinna, which is Latin for “wing” or “fin”)
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Ive found Phonak Lumity have plenty of bass, when adjusted, but the typical first fit for speech does not have enough bass. All the higher parts are solid right out of the box.
Hello Don. That’s interesting and maybe
not surprising, given the decades-old assumption by designers and clinicians that anything below about 250 Hz does not assist speech clarity and might let more extraneous sounds get amplified. Some truth in that, for sure, but there was a recent paper (I’m away from my files just now) saying some folk definitely benefit speech-wise when allowed more lows. I’m definitely one of those. And, oddly, the people who benefit more are those with a strong high-end loss. Yep, that’s me - and from your curve you post here, looks like you too. But every ear, every brain, every lifestyle is different - of course!
Word of the Day: Tragus Who knew? But yes, a good seal is essential - provided the individual isn’t too prone to sweaty ear canals.
For short term listening to a radio/music player, I plan to make my own earmould: I have discovered that the contents of a Chinese glue-stick will solidify to something very like acrylic after a few days exposed. So, I shall press some into my lughole (technical term), with an intervening piece of baking foil for safety, and then, once set (out of my ear) will drill a hole to let sound in.
Am I serious??? Yes! Here in prosperous UK some of us extract or fill our own teeth. Ears ain’t nuffink. And… please… none of the above is advice!
For your own safety, see an audiologist.
… a few days later… the gluestick sculpture did dry
but no way does it fit my ear! There’s a lot of skill in obtaining an accurate impression.
When the neighbours are out, my first choice is to listen on loudspeakers via well-adjusted early Phonaks.
Speaker shortcomings always got in the way - hooting, squawking and ‘juggy’ resonances on anything like a normal household budget. They confuse the brain and the hearing device.
So I tried the ‘open back’ configuration, now said to be regaining popularity. No box, just an open speaker chassis, without walls too close behind
In my case that’s a pair of vintage 10-inch JBL my son gave me.
Well, what a revelation! Instruments sound separated, voices far more natural, harpsichord properly delicate, Steinway piano sounding much like those wonderful instruments do.
If you like deep bass (quite right too!) you do need to include a sub, and the open backs benefit from a bit of bass lift anyway. Room acoustic as always has a bearing, but people report that this is often tamed by the fact of the added rearward sound.
It can all be done on a man-shed budget: pre-owned stuff adding up to a lot less than one hearing aid!
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For future generations this is what I did to compensate for my hearing loss, I created a “reverse” EQ curve based on my latest test for my stereo to enjoy while listening and playing music.
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Surely worthwhile, SOL. Good headphones will always outperform an aid musically, but with a hearing curve like yours (mine is similar), the top end sounds dull.
Likewise my table radio, an excellent very old B&O portable: because it is ‘open back’ it’s not afflicted with that familar boxy ‘honk’ but was to my ears muffled. So… 15 dB of boost manshedded in from 2k up to 6 k sorted that - but some music and voiced then sounded screechy and could overdrive the audio.
So, manshed two: add little ‘vactrol’ optical component to compress the stronger peaks: absolutely the equivalent of what a well fitted hearing aid would do. Sorted!
Wouldn’t it be great if radios and TVs provided
such options, rather than counter-productive bass-boost or whatever. The added cost to a manufacturer would, at a guess, come in under two dollars.
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My 2cents worth: a few models of Sony CD Walkman portable CD players came equipped with a parametric equaliser that enabled the user to selectively boost mid and high frequencies by different amounts.
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Took a look on eBay - and yes there were some great Walkmans, still sought after
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