I use bilateral Phonak aids, helpful in quiet settings - hone sitting room with family and the like. I have problems in restaurant settings and in committee meetings.
Specific questions -
Experience with such Roger devices, which ones, how helpful, can you get them to try for a week or two? Boots audiologist said no. However if bought via email I should have at least 14 days if not longer right to return.
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I have the previous generation of Phonak hearing aids - Paradise - and theyāre very good (technically mine are the Costco version, resold as KS10). Definitely a step change from my NHS aids.
Earlier this year I ordered the Roger On iN, the first version, which is superb. I mainly use mine for streaming audio for work calls to my hearing aids but itās excellent in meetings where you can again change its settings through an app. The second edition of this adds the ability to use the Roger as the mic for Teams, Zoom etc but otherwise I donāt see a ton of difference.
My employer purchased the Roger device for me, but I have the older Roger āpenā device, which is still useful but lacks the smartphone app integration.
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I love my Phonak Roger Table Mic II x 4.
I wear Phonak M70, P70 and just about to get the L90.
Mainly wear my P70 currently.
I also love the Phonak Partner Mic.
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I got my Phonak HAs about 4 years ago, and got a Roger Select iN along with them. The HAs are Marvels with a telecom loop. Maybe I can remember the model and so forth in a bit (M90-13T, I believe). Same with the Select.
Whatever, I find the Select to be invaluable. When I go out to dinner with my spouse, she wears the. Roger around her neck and we can converse comfortably. That isnāt possible for times my mature memory forgets to gather up Roger before we go out. On such occasions, sans Roger that is, communication is almost impossible in a relatively noisy environment such is found in most modern restaurants (what happened to those nice places of my youth with the heavy white table cloths?).
Then, when we have others out to dinner with us, such as this past week when my younger son, his spouse, and their 4-year old came to visit, I place olā Roger on the table. It does a wonderful job of picking up their voices, even from across the table, so that I can converse freely with everyone at the table.
At home, Roger mostly lives connected to the TV so that my spouse and I can have seperate volume levels.
A year ago, Roger had an accident and stopped working. Fortunately my audiologist was able to resuscitate him. Had she not, my spouse would gladly have forked out the lettuce to get me another. Not only is Roger invaluable to me, but heās also invaluable to the people who would like to socialize with me.
I donāt know your specific situation, but in my case, my audiologist was happy to let me have a few weeks trial with the Roger before I had to search far and wide for the funds to purchase him.
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I have TWO pairs of rechargeable Phonak Lumity Life hearing aids, which I change out every other day so neither is ever āmothballedā.
Youāll see from my audiogram that short of a Bionic Womanās ear implant, I could use help across the board. I mustāve lucked out! Iāve had a loaner Roger ON IN V2 since early Sept. I get in on the 13th of Oct to swap this loaner for at least ONE Roger V2 (or two, if I need a separate stick + license to put on my other pair of Lumity Life aids).
It could be that I have a great relationship with my audi, and she pushed the envelope on my behalf with Phonak, but you should DEFINITELY get a decent trial usage, and I think 2 weeks is a fair amount of time to see you benefit from using the device.
There are plusses and not-so-plusses with the V2 stick. Itās SUPER transportable (about the size of a small dill pickle?), and works not only plugged in to a TV as streamer, but also streams audio into your ears if held as a pointer or placed on a tabletop at a restaurant or dinner party. I donāt use it as a device that someone ELSE wears in a lanyard (comes with the kit) cuz I donāt have any speaker/audience activities. So thatās 3 uses right there.
The range of the Roger V2 is longer than the older Phonak TV Connector, but the audio quality is harsh, kind of like a public address system in all but the straight connected-to-TV mode.
There are several threads here you can check out (doing keyword search in the search window at top right), among which is how to install, remove, transfer and re-install the Roger V2 license. That is the boondoggle. It appears that Phonak sells only TWO licenses per Roger stick. So you get one license transferred to the RIGHT aid, and one to the LEFt aid. DOH! Stupid compared to the ease of pairing + connecting multiple hearing aids to the old TV Connector.
But! They didnāt want to leave money on the table, no sirree! Next thing you know, theyāll be charging us for the minute used on our aids, requiring a phone app to track that usage. Handy way to SHUT things down if we didnāt pay up.
Despite that minor digression ā¦ Iām a big fan of the way my world sounds with Phonak aids, and very much value both the TV Connector and the Roger V2 devices. I recommend you push back, get the loaner for a good 2 weeks and go from there. Hey, put down $100 deposit if they feel youāll run off with them. 
Thank you all for your helpful replies.
I had given thought to what might have been a cheaper option - buy a good quality Bluetooth microphone and connect that to the aids the way phones and some other things do, but hen I discovered that Roger doesnāt use Bluetooth - it uses a different wireless protocol so that wouldnāt work. Crafty, but understandable from the companyās economics!
Anyway, it does seem worth the test but with something costing well over a Ā£1,000 I would like a reasonable trial period like the 30 days one gets with the Phonak HAs from Boots.
I find that Roger streaming doesnāt slay the batteries in my HAs the same way as Bluetooth does. Itās good for that.
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I have all the Roger devices and a Phonak Bluetooth microphone. All are great with different capabilities and limits and degrees of greatness. The ON is by far the most versatile and easy-to-use. Table Mic the most powerful. Bluetooth the cheapest. Select in between. Pens oldie but goodie but limited. Clip-on terrific 1 to 1. Again, all great and any one can make a big difference in your life.
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I have Phonak Audeo Paradise P90ās. They are two years old.
They finally work well for me after I found a new hearing aid practitioner to set them up. The audiologist who provided them to me new couldnāt/didnāt set them up so I could hear.
Just saying so to help.
Everything is an option. I have rechargeable batteries. Iād rather have replacement batteries as I used to. Iāve run out. I have a remote control. I have a microphone for others to wear if they want to communicate with me. And I have a tv connector. I donāt have the tabletop mic yetā¦Iād like to.
DaveL
Toronto
The Phonak Roger select works great when I sit with family or friends at dinner. Although the select permits me to hear and participate in all discussions, it does amplify surrounding sounds too. At most restaurants it works well, my daughter-in-law commented recently that she noticed that I participated in all the talk.
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I am tempted but while fortunately affordable it is still a significant sum of money, and at 84 with metastatic prostate cancer with 50% chance of surviving another 5 years I wonder if I really need it. Maybe better leaving the Ā£1,500 in my estate for my wife and kids! Is there a re-sale market as a second hand unit or does Phonak tie that up too?
On a practical and less gloomy level, as I need to purchase on-line to get a 30 day trial period, do I need an audiologist to help setup. The video on the site implies it is as simple as connecting the HAs to my Smartphone. Set Roger in pairing mode, set HA in pairing mode and wait for the result! 
However in the order text it says it needs setting up by my audiologist or by me with their help.
And as I said above my audiologist didnāt seem in the least bit enthusiastic about Roger when I askedā¦
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A lot of questions. Some probably better for your family physician, some for a financial counselor, if you are religious some for a religious advisor, some for a psychiatrist.
For here, setting up Roger systems can be complicated. Not too hard if you have the technical competence to understand the directions and the physical dexterity to follow those directions. Otherwise, you will definitely need help.
Second-hand on-line. You pay you money and takes you chances.
GET IT. Five years is a LONG time to enjoy - and HEAR! - life! Yes, there is resale at eBay and perhaps other sites, but that shouldnāt be YOUR concern. Seriously.
In five years even medical advances can extend your life. I wouldnāt even think twice about this - and I donāt care if your audiogram is that of a child. 
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Absolutely! I use Roger a lot, for TV, letting my spouse take me out to dinner, and so forth. I donāt much notice the battery drain. But, if I decide to walk my dog, Edamame, whilst streaming music from my iPhone, or just make a lot of phone calls (a rare thing for me, given that my kids have dubbed me a āphone retardā), just a few hours of such activity takes a day or so away from my battery life. So, several hours each day of Roger versus several hours two or three days in a week with music/phone calls makes a difference between 5 days between battery changes or 7-to-eight days between changes.
Of course, weāre not talking big bucks. Five days between battery replacements versus eight days amounts to something like $13/year. But, if youāre someone interested in nickel-and-diming yourself to relative comfort, those $13 here and there start to add up.
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I read the valuable information you already got until now.
Here are my two cents to your questions.
If you have Roger Ready HAās the process is really simple. If they are older so not Roger āreadyā the setup will be more complex. But there is enough written about this topic on the forum here.
Another complicating factor is that when you are living in the EU you cannot regularly buy the āInā version so you have to work with the coupling device to bring the licenses to your aids. They only sell the cheaper version which will be more expensive at the end as you need the additional equipment and if you are not a DIY help. Workaround for that is buying the Roger inofficially on eBay or where ever.
Important to know is if you could benefit from the given characteristics.
What it really does is that it streams the captured sounds āin the speech frequency rangeā right to your ears by streaming. So this means filtered sound and through this additional noise reduced. Important if your speech in noise recognition is affected and in what extent. And how about your word recognition ability. These will be personally different from other users.
Imagine you put it on the table it works as if you go with your ears closer to the person you put or point the device at. In this case you just not are getting closer with your ears but instead stay seated or staying where you are, youāre ears on a long stick away from you over there where you want to listen. Thatās how it works.
Another benefit, as stated before, it does not connect to your HA by Bluetooth so the streaming uses less battery as a Bluetooth solution.
If it is worth the money is your own judgement. If your usecase is matching it could be of daily benefit as you will enjoy it every day of your lifetime. Also the expected second hand price, in case your descendants have to sell it, is still very good.
But really try before you buy if you are unsure if it benefits you in your usecases. I think the two weeks you get in online buying will be enough to test it out.
Good luck,
Emile (happy owner of In and On versions as well as the older Pen and also TV streamer)
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Thanks Emile - useful comments. I have found 2 UK companies that seem to sell the n version. As you no doubt know, we are no longer in the EU (sort off but I wonāt go in to that 
) but Iāll check on the point you raised re licence.
All of you have taken the trouble to reply have been most helpful. As I can get a 30 day trial it seems I should give it at try - only way of really knowing.
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Hi,
As a UK user I understand all your frustrations, and feel for you on justifying the expense etc.
With regard to your age and health issues, Iād say go for it. Even if your time is relatively short, your relatives would rather you be able to communicate in these circumstances, Iām sure you have planty to offer. Iām 63 and went private this year, to buy Phonak P90s, AND ESPECIALLY, to gain access to an Audiologist whoāll spend the extra time to fine tune the programming (NHS gave me little more than āfirst fitā, 30 minutes max). I saw the Ā£3000 expense as a long term investment in my health and enjoyment of social activities. I expect at least 6 years from these, and the investment has vastly reduced my withdrawal from conversations in noisy places. Roger can do this for you.
As you suggest, there is a second hand market on ebay, which is how Iāve obtained my Roger devices. It is a minefield, however, if you donāt understand how these devices connect, and you can buy the wrong things.
Sadly, in my experience, none of the audiologists Iāve come across (NHS & Private), knew ANYTHING about Roger devices. One even asked: āWhatās that?ā when I showed her my Roger On, so Iāve built up my knowledge from this very forum. My current (private) Audiologist asks me questions about them now!
What specific model of Phonak hearing aids do you have, as connection methods differ?
Peter
Iāve searched for years for information to help me learn about being hard of hearing.
My second set of Phonaks was terrible. My second audiologist had ruined my first set of Phonaks with their setup I was their customer for 8 years.
The next audiologist got Phonak Audeo Paradise P90Rās for me. He never set them up right, in spite of using REM.
Hereās a book that Iām enjoying.
VOLUME CONTROL
Hearing in a deafening world
by David Owen
At first it was very slow for me. Now I canāt put it down. Iām learning a lot.
DaveL
Toronto
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I have the same as you I think - Phonak Audeo Paradise P90ās - one year old.
I once talked about this to a fellow medic who was a flat mate at med school. He later went on to get an MBE for his research work (https://www.aihhp.org/events/hearingexponov2019/richard-ramsden/). what he basically said was that matching a hearing aid to a patient was very much an individual thing and the best/most expensive was not necessarily the best one for the individual. There are two main aspects to hearing - improving the signal delivered to the brain which a hearing aid can do, but then the brain has to interpret that signal. No hearing aid will help that aspect of deafness.
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Same hearing aids. Phonak Audeo Paradise P90Rās 2 of them.
Two years old. Dispensing audiologist asked me to find someone else who could help me more.
Theyāre set up now. Using Target quick fit and using the same hearing study settings as the selling audi.
I can hear!
BUT.
On autosense I have situations where I canāt hear. If my wife is off to the side I canāt hear her. I used the app to check. Speech is registered exactly to the front of me, and is excluded as background noise to the side.
Reading a lot.
We used to increase loudness to hear better. Increase gain.
Now we have directional mic and the chip listens where it detects we are looking.
We also have the HA cooking frequencies. My hearing loss is due to exposure to loud noise. So HAās shunt the frequency down and distorts the sound. Or thatās my take.
It also has settings that lock the two hearing aids together. (that wasnāt set before by the audi that sold)
And settings (Dynamic) to adjust compression
I also have tiny tiny wax guards. With far fewer holes. They plug fast, and my ears are pretty clean.
Whoever designed those should have to replace them every time I need it. I hate them with a passion.
And one dome fell off last week. Quick trip to the Dr to see if it was in my ear canal. Thatās happened before.
I can hear better! But there are some real limits in the design.
Hear the lumpy is better. Ooops. Lumity not lumpy.
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