Costco Kirkland Signature 9.0 (Product Information)

Just a friendly suggestion - If it is a movie, I would give her the remote, and let her pause the TV when she wants to speak to you. That might work better all the way around.

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Just wondering . . . If an audio source other than the TV is plugged into the 3.5 port on the TV Connector, does the TV Connector send the audio as Airstream or send it as ordinary Bluetooth?
In other words, do the KS9s receive from the TV Connector by Airstream regardless of which audio input is plugged into the Connector?
Just guessing, I’m assuming/hoping that it sends it as Airstream regardless of which input port is used.

The TV connector has no way of knowing the origins of the audio it is streaming, so it streams.

RDB

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Nate, they go right in on top of my hearing aids, no physical interference at all. The receivers are well into the ear canal while the the ear buds sit in the outer part of the ear. Speech recognition with the buds is excellent, even though nothing is going through the hearing aid, because the buds are putting sound right into the ear canal. I don’t have open domes any more, but there are small openings in the new domes and the sound from the buds seems to pass through unaffected. This obviously is not a solution for people who have closed domes.

There is another advantage for this setup, so long as it is practical to keep a set of wireless buds with the ipads. I have one, dedicated, paired connection to each device. With the MFI interface I had the hearing aids paired to, like, four different Apple devices. There would be connection delays and confusion, and the whole thing never seemed to work quite right. And the device that I always wanted to break the connection to would invariably be in the other room, so there was inconvenience. (I mean, really, Apple, what are you thinking? All of my Apple devices are always communicating with each other, and coordinated. Why not have a screen that I can pull up on each device that shows all of the devices that are currently paired to the MFI device, and which one is currently connected, and make it so that I can break the connection to the device currently connected and make the connection to the device that I want to use at the moment without having to go find the currently connected device and break the connection.)

What I envision is simple connections with the KS9, so that there isn’t a lot of confusion - no connection to the aids through the ipads, TV streame through dedicated channel, and phone through Apple watch via Bluetooth to hearing aids.

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I am hoping to get it working well when paired to the watch so that I don’t always have to have my phone with me.

You are describing your process your answering calls. What is your process for making calls?

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Thanks, rdboukes.
Good answer and the one I was hoping for!
Reason being that I think I have one or two unused bluetooth receivers with 3.5 output lying around here somewhere and I am dreaming up a sort of Rube Goldberg way of expanding the number of sources I can put through the TV Connector to have available through my KS9s without running cables or adding more hardware. Or maybe through my toslink switcher with IR remote.
My goal being to stop using standard BT with my KS9s because of the daily battery consumption and intermittent breakup.
Multiple access via Airstream and no pairing/unpairing would be nice.
An idle mind is the devil’s workshop"
LOL! :grinning:

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Well, this is another interesting approach if the kludge I am describing above does not work out. But are you saying you are doing this with one pair of wannabe “Airbuds” or one pair for each device, which would sound like a lot of “bud switching” to coin a phrase. LOL!
And the link to the wannabe $25 Air Buds would be appreciated when you have a chance. Thanks.

I choose not to use my KS9s with my phone, as I prefer continuing to use the app I have had on my Android phone for several years called: AutoSpeaker, which immediately turns on my phone’s speaker when making or receiving a phone call, together with popping up an icon giving me an option to switch to turn the speaker off and switch to holding the phone up to my ear if I am in a public place, which is rare.

Of course when I first got the KS9s I had it set up with the HAs via bluetooth but it seemed unnecessary and interfered with my Alexa setup in my car which I use constantly when driving for hands-free communication with my sig/other, listening to NPR and verbally switching stations and music preferences, navigation to where I’m going, etc. (In fact when i need to call her from a store I use Alexa on my cell for “Drop-In” rather than calling through my cell carrier. Faster and louder on both ends and that way she doesn’t have to go find and grab her cell phone. She can be anywhere in the house and answer and speak hands-free.) This uses my phone’s bluetooth hands-free input and my car’s speakers for hands-free output. My phone stays in my pants pocket or holster the whole time I am driving, which is a higher priority for me than hands-free phone conversations which takes place almost entirely at home since I am retired. If I were still working, my priorities and settings would likely be different.

All of which leads me to my interest in other uses for the Bluetooth and Airstream in my KS9s.

Got the KS9’s about 3 weeks ago and have a couple of questions for the group . . .

  1. I’m having a hard time hearing conversations while in a loud noisy environment, i.e. sitting around a table with 8 other people in a large restaurant. Is this something that can be adjusted or is this just a normal situation?

  2. I’m hearing a periodic low volume noise only in the left hearing aid. The best I can describe it is a low volume “white noise”. It comes and goes fairly constantly. I assume that this is NOT normal and will be discussing this with the audiologist at my next Costco appointment. Is anyone else experiencing this??

Although you didn’t include an audiogram or describe your hearing loss, I’m guessing you have near normal hearing in the lower frequencies. My answers are based on this assumption.

  1. There are tweaks that might help some, but this is just a very challenging situation for anybody. It’s complicated by your good low frequency hearing and presumed open domes because there’s no way to block out the noise.

  2. This sounds like “processor noise” or “floor noise.” (the sound the hearing aid makes) I’m guessing your left ear has better low frequency hearing than your right.

These are the earbuds that I bought:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07XCNXY4N/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I bought two pair, one for each of my iPads. Pair 1 is paired to iPad 1. Pair 2 is paired to iPad 2. When I open the storage case cover the connection is made with the iPad. It occurs so fast that by the time I can get them into my ears they are connected and ready to go. It works so much cleaner, faster, more reliable than when I had the MFI interface. And the sound is far better.

This obviously isn’t going to work well for a person who has his/her iPad all over the house because it is going to be difficult to keep the earbuds and the iPad together. I use each of my iPads in the same place nearly all of the time, so it is easy to keep the buds right next to the iPads, hidden out of the way until I want to use them.

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Went for a fitting of the KS9 yesterday at Costco Watford in the UK.

The aids are approx £1200 + (approx) £60 for custom receivers and (approx) £60 for the TV connector. In terms of U.S dollars this comes to around $1700.

I am getting the KS9 as backups. I intend to get either the OPN S custom or Marvel Custom when that comes out with an independent audiologist. The price was too keen to give the KS9s a miss!

I will get the receivers back in about 2 weeks, so will report back then.

The only other information gleaned is that the Phillips range seems to be based on Bernafon - that’s what the audiologist told me. She has had more success with Phonak up to now, but they are waiting for an update on the Phillips range.

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The next time you hear the white noise off and on try rebooting your phone. I noticed the same thing and looked at the phone app and aids were in bluetooth mode. Changed to autosense and rebooted phone and all was good. I have a Samsung S7 and at times it doesn’t release aids back to Autosense. Let me know if that helps please.

Whoa! This is crazy talk!

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My Samsung S8 randomly connects and disconnects from bluetooth. I ended up disabling the bluetooth option for audio and only have it activated for calls. When I want to listen to audio from my phone I turn the audio option on again.

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Very cool!
And thanks for the link, and the detailed usage explanation. :smiley:

MDB or anyone who knows…
If there is mid-range hearing loss that is moderate and also some hearing loss in the low/high frequencies is it hard to block out noise in restaurants even with the manual programs in the ks9 and what is difference between loud noise and noise. I think he added the loud noise program…

Also I find by the evening when I watch tv voices seem more muffled. In morning watching tv things are good using automatic… I don’t use streaming but regular…at night though maybe due to tiredness or the feeling of occlusion getting too much the voices seem to lose clarity and sharpness… I’d love any thoughts on why that happens…

I think it’s just plain hard for hearing aids to deal with noise. It’s even harder (impossible?) to deal with it if you have good low frequency hearing and an open fit because there’s nothing to block the sound coming into your ear. If being able to understand speech in noisy situations is a must have for you, the best bet is to get a hearing aid that’s compatible with a good remote microphone. (Costco has a Resound model and their MultiMic is excellent. Non Costco option is Phonak Marvel with a Roger device-- pretty pricy) If understanding speech in noise is more of a “would be nice,” keep tweaking the KS9s and you’ll likely get some improvement.

I’ve noticed similar issues regarding TV. I don’t have a good explanation other than I think the brain just gets tired. Part of it may be the kind of shows you’re watching. Talk shows and news broadcasts are definitely much easier to understand than TV series or movies with conflicting music/background noises.

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What BT accessories available from Amazon are KS9.0 users using successfully?

cleveto,

Thanks for the idea however, I don’t think that my situation is similar to yours. When I hear the “white noise” I checked the app and the aids were in Automatic mode. I went ahead and rebooted the phone anyway and, sad to say, there was no change. Still hear the noise.

Thanks for the idea anyway . . .

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