Hearing aids making white noise/hiss/static sounds in response to low background noise

[raetee]

Hi all,

I got my first set of hearing aids (Philips 9040) from Costco in December, so I am new to all of this. While overall I am very happy with the aids, I have one issue that my audiologist hasn’t been able to resolve yet so I’m posting here in the hope that someone can offer some things to try next time I have an appointment. There are some similar threads for different aids (e.g. 1, 2, 3) but some suggested solutions are manufacturer-specific and some are what the audiologist tried already so I’m posting my own thread as I’m really looking to understand what is going on here in case it helps me find a fix. I haven’t ventured into DIY at present, so I would need some suggestions to take to my audiologist.

When I’m in a totally quiet place, my aids don’t make any hiss or white noise that I am aware of. But as soon as I’m in a situation where there is some background noise (air handling system, extractor fan, oven or microwave, road noise, robovac running in another room, tap running, etc.) I get a noise like radio static (I’ve also seen it described as bacon frying) that is always presented to my ear at the same pitch no matter what the pitch of the source background noise. It’s like the aids are desperate to pick up something, but they don’t give it to my ear at the source frequency but at this different very specific hissing/frying frequency. I know it’s not a primary noise the aids produce all the time because they don’t make it when I’m in a silent place; I know it’s not my ears picking up sounds that they couldn’t hear before because it’s a hiss at the same pitch no matter what the pitch or type of the source sound. So it appears to be the aids picking up the background noise but not giving it to my ears in the correct way.

Some other points:

• It’s less obvious when I turn the volume down and when I use the “noise” program on my aids, and it’s more obvious in the “hearing in noise” program.
• I experience it as worse in my right ear than my left despite very similar gain settings across both ears.
• It is present both when I’m close to the noise source (e.g. right next to the microwave) and when I’m in the next room. I tend to notice it more when things are otherwise quiet but it seems to be there constantly while the noise in question is running.

I had a followup with my audiologist (who btw I am overall very happy with) and he said basically that it’s something I might have to live with as it’s something all aids will do in order to allow me to hear soft sounds and soft-spoken people. I am someone who has lived quite happily for years with high-frequency tinnitus so I don’t believe I’m over-sensitive, but I haven’t managed to live with this white noise yet, probably because I find it much more intrusive and loud, and probably also because it’s also not constant, because it depends on the presence of the background noise. When I explained how bothersome I find it, the audiologist did reduce the gain across most frequencies and more extensively for the “soft sounds”, but I can’t say that it’s helped at all (possibly marginally).

I am really unsure where to go from here because the fact that it happens with different source sounds (a tap running is higher frequency than air handling systems I would think) means it’s not a very specific frequency that can be turned down, and reducing things modestly everywhere hasn’t fixed the issue. I am worried that reducing gain further across the board would then mean I don’t get the most out of my aids in terms of correction and I might miss what people are saying (which has been a big benefit of my aids so far). In many of the other threads I could see responses along the lines of “I had this with manufacturer X but not at all with manufacturer Y”, and I’m still within the Costco return period so could try returning the Philips and trying the Jabras, for example, but I’d prefer to see if it can be fixed another way (I’d love to be able to trial a different aid for a day just for comparison, but that’s not something my Costco offers).

I’m going to attempt to upload my aided response charts in case that helps the experts (it doesn’t mean much to me). These are from before the adjustments were made.

Thanks very much for any advice you can give me! Reading this forum has been so helpful as a complete newbie.

[Zebras]

@raetee

I get a noise like radio static (I’ve also seen it described as bacon frying) that is always presented to my ear at the same pitch

Compression is the issue.

Sometimes this can be solved with adjustments or moving to a more powerful receiver if you’re near the bottom of the fitting range for your current receiver.

[MDB]

I definitiely don’t know. I’ve heard of such sounds from hearing aid noise reduction working.

[x475aws]

Chapter 5 “Expansion” in the Starkey Compression Handbook looks relevant.

[Volusiano]

@raetee

When I’m in a totally quiet place, my aids don’t make any hiss or white noise that I am aware of. But as soon as I’m in a situation where there is some background noise (air handling system, extractor fan, oven or microwave, road noise, robovac running in another room, tap running, etc.) I get a noise like radio static (I’ve also seen it described as bacon frying) that is always presented to my ear at the same pitch no matter what the pitch of the source background noise. It’s like the aids are desperate to pick up something, but they don’t give it to my ear at the source frequency but at this different very specific hissing/frying frequency.

I know it’s not a primary noise the aids produce all the time because they don’t make it when I’m in a silent place; I know it’s not my ears picking up sounds that they couldn’t hear before because it’s a hiss at the same pitch no matter what the pitch or type of the source sound. So it appears to be the aids picking up the background noise but not giving it to my ears in the correct way.

I have a guess as to what it is you’re hearing, but I’m not sure how you get into that mode in the first place.

Generally, if your hearing aids’ mics are put into a directional mode, it’s a well known established phenomenon (published in technical papers on hearing aids) that this will result in a low frequency roll-off. The hearing aids usually compensates for this roll-off by increasing the amplification at the low end, resulting in higher internal microphone static noise level than normal.

That is why it sounds like a radio static noise → it’s the noise floor that is being amplified that you hear. And since you have almost normal hearing at 250 to 500 Hz, your ears pick up this noise floor easily. That is also why it doesn’t match the pitch/frequency range of the background noise source that appears, whatever it may be (fan, road, water running). It’s also possible that for some reason, your hearing has the same resonant frequency as that of the static noise floor, further exacerbating the amplitude of this noise floor.

I’m not sure if there’s something about the Philips 9040 setup that tells the aids to switch the mics into directional mode automatically or not. But apparently the introduction/presence of a noise source seems to trigger it into a directional mode. In the absence of a noise source, the aids probably go into an omnidirectional mode, so the low-frequency roll-off phenomenon disappears. That’s something you and your HCP will need to investigate.

Below is a page on the Philips HearSuite software for the 9040, with the various help explanation for the various features on that page. Maybe review it, then see what settings you’re on, and play around with those settings, especially the directionality settings, to see if you choose a mode where the mics don’t get automatically put into a directional mode too soon. Or maybe play around with the SoundMap Noise Control Transition levels to have it be less aggressive in doing dynamic directionality too early for you.

[raetee]

Thanks so much to everyone who has responded so far - reading through this forum has honestly been amazing for me at the beginning of my aided-hearing journey and I am so grateful to you all for the suggestions on my current issue.

@Volusiano, this suggestion about the noise floor and directionality settings is the one that strikes me as most convincing right now. I’ve been mystified by why it’s always at the same pitch and bears no resemblance to the sound of the source, yet is absent in a totally quiet room and only manifests itself when the aid seems to notice a sound and ramps up to try to catch it (and sometimes seems to choose not to do it). Basically what I hear is this: bacon frying youtube video (minus the louder pops) but the source noise can be pretty much anything. (Amazing what you can find on youtube btw!)

The fact that I don’t think I’ve heard the noise while using the “hifi music” program, which I believe may be fixed in omnidirectional mode and have pretty much everything else turned off, might support your hypothesis. It’s somewhat difficult to tell because that program does amplify everything around, so I hear so many sounds that I believe are genuine amplifications of the background noises - but I do think the bacon hiss is less prominent.

One strange thing is that this afternoon I was testing out a smaller set of domes (I was fitted with the 8mm minifit open bass domes, but they are slightly difficult to push into my canals, so at the last visit my audiologist gave me some 6mm domes to try - these only just fit over my 85dB receivers and give a slightly loose fitting in the canal). What I noticed was that my bacon frying noise seemed louder with the looser fitting. So I tried a pair of 8mm bass domes (closed domes), which the audiologist had also given me to swap in and out with my regular domes for the purposes of improved bass sounds when streaming. The bacon frying sound was reduced with the closed domes. If we take it that the bacon noise is amplifier noise being fed through to the receiver and broadcast to my ear, I’m still not quite sure why I should hear it more with the open domes and less with the closed ones, given that it’s 100% definitely coming through the receiver.

My audiologist does seem willing to explore things with me so I will take this suggestion to him and we’ll see.

@x475aws and @Zebras, thanks! Regarding compression, that Starkey compression handbook is very helpful in understanding what is going on in the way the aids process sound, but it was quite difficult to get a viewable copy of the PDF. For some reason Starkey seem to have updated the links on their website and at least when I try to view it via the links posted here and also the googlable links, what I see is an html page full of the indecipherable raw PDF code. But I managed to get a copy from before the Starkey website update via the wayback machine:

The_Compression_Handbook.pdf

If anyone else is having the same difficulty I faced, hopefully that link will work.

[Volusiano]

@raetee

I’m still not quite sure why I should hear it more with the open domes and less with the closed ones, given that it’s 100% definitely coming through the receiver.

That’s easy to understand. If you go with looser fitting domes, the chance of sound leakage is higher. If you go with bass domes that are closed with no vent, then the chance of sound leakage is smaller. If your HCP specifies the kind of dome fitting you wear, then the software knows and re-prescribe to the correct dome. For closed vent bass domes, the prescription will be “weakened” a little bit because the formula for the gain now account for less sound leakage, so a new “weakened” prescription will reduce the amplification, therefore suppresses the noise floor down. And of course the converse is true for more open domes. The re-prescription will increase the gain (thereby increase the noise floor) to account for the sound leakage.

The question is if you know whether your HCP did specify to the software of the dome change or not? Another question is whether your HCP ran REM again after you change your dome fitting? If yes, then the re-prescription above would hold true, and if REM is rerun, the REM measurement will reflect any sound leakage (or sound containment) and the gain is adjusted accordingly, to stronger gain to make up for the leakage, or weaker gain adjustment to account the better sound containment.

BUT, if your HCP did not update the software for any of your dome changes, and also did not run REM, then it’d be harder to explain your experience (less floor noise with closed dome). Then it may be due to the dynamic directionality setting in the hearing aids doing something to control the feedback potential that can be increased or decreased by the change in the dome that can lead to a change in amplification, which leads to what you experience.

[raetee]

Thanks! No, no software changes or REM - these were on-the-fly tests that I was doing myself this afternoon with some domes the audiologist gave me to take away with me. I don’t like the closed domes for everyday use because of the occlusive effect and because I am still using my residual hearing in the lower frequencies, but prior to my last appointment I happened to notice that when I put my fingers in my ears, I get better bass sounds when streaming music direct to the aids, so the audiologist gave me some closed domes just to experiment with for that particular use case. So yeah, harder to explain but perhaps something related to the way it assesses feedback potential…

[Volusiano]

@raetee

I happened to notice that when I put my fingers in my ears, I get better bass sounds when streaming music direct to the aids, so the audiologist gave me some closed domes just to experiment with for that particular use case.

Yup, it’s all about sealing off any vent that will let the amplified sound leak out. Normally the high frequency amplified sounds don’t need to be “trapped” in to vibrate adequately inside your ear canal because it has high enough energy to vibrate your ear drums enough even if some leaks out of the vent. Low frequency sounds, on the other hand, carries lower energy, so if they are allowed to “leak” out too much through the vent, there is not enough energy left inside the ear canals to vibrate the ear drums sufficiently. But once your trap the low frequency sound inside your ear canal by plugging up the vent holes, the trapped in energy will vibrate the ear drums more strongly to give you the perceived higher low frequency volume.

If you specify to the hearing aid software that you’re using open domes, or bass dome with vent(s), the software will prescribe accordingly (with more amplification) to compensate for the low frequency leakage out of the vent. But if you just manually plug up the vent with your fingers, or change to closed up domes, without telling the software that you changed to close domes, the compensated low frequency amplification does not get changed (reduced) accordingly to match the closed dome, so you end up hearing more bass with the closed up vent.

Also remember that there is only so much low frequency amplification the tiny little receiver can do, so you normally can never get the same kind of bass quality/volume compared to a larger speaker to begin with. That’s why streaming content using hearing aids never sound full of bass compared to listening to music from a real (bigger) speaker source where the better bass travel through the vent into your ear naturally (for folks with good low frequency hearing left).

[Diver50]

See my Thread Starkey Genesis Experience. Not the same, but similar. My background noise was not a hiss, but a rumble.

[sterei]

@Volusiano

That’s why streaming content using hearing aids never sound full of bass

It helped me a lot when I increased the gain for low frequencies in the streaming program. There is no “leakage sound” bypassing from the evironment.

[raetee]

It helped me a lot when I increased the gain for low frequencies in the streaming program. There is no “leakage sound” bypassing from the evironment.

I did the same in my streaming equalizer and I agree this helped me a lot too. But then the addition of fingers in ears or closed domes (only for streaming) improved things yet further. In my case I suppose the gain for my low frequencies is set quite low in the regular software settings, as I use my (still quite reasonable) low frequency hearing to hear low frequency external noises. So open domes and no fingers in ears would be the best idea for me when listening to live music. But for streaming there is no external sound to listen to, and so a combination of bumping up the gain for low frequencies and also ensuring more of the sound is “trapped” is what sounded best to my ears when streaming music direct to my aids. This may not be the same for everyone of course.

[Volusiano]

That’s why Phonak invents the Active Vent receiver. It automatically opens or closes depending on the listening situations to give you the optimal experience. For example, when streaming or when in noisy environment, it may close the vent up to lock in the streaming content from leaking out in the first case, or to block out the noise going in through the vent for the second case. But for normal situations, or when listening to live music, it would open up the vent to make the natural sounds come through to help add in with the amplified sounds, all the while providing a non-occlusive listening experience as well.

[flashb1024]

@raetee

But then the addition of fingers in ears or closed domes (only for streaming) improved things yet further.

Here’s a hack that should work for you:
Get some foam earplugs, and cut them down a bit so you don’t look like the Frankenstein monster.
Insert the foamies behind your domes till they seal. Magic bass!
Another way is a small cotton ball instead of the earplugs, cut down to seal the ear.

Tbh, I gave up on streaming, and use my Etymotic ER3 SE IEMs with Shure Olive ear tips, connected to a FiiO BTR5 DAC/Amp.
Stream hi rez from my pixel phone using APTX HD codec! Audiophile heaven.

[fbacher1]

I was going to post about the very same issue but I’ll revive this thread instead. In my case the Philips 9040’s DO NOT generate this bacon frying sound but my new SmartRic Widex hearing aids do. Above 50 mph on a cement freeway the bacon sound comes on and is pretty loud and extremely annoying at 70 mph. I can get rid of it almost completely by lowering the volume in the app or setting the mid-freq EQ value way down. The audi made a tweak yesterday lowering the mid-freq and now I get by with volume set to 3 (5 is nominal) or the mid freq EQ set to-4.

The Philips 9040’s on loan while my 9030’s are out for service have zero noise on the freeway and are much better in the wind too which is really horrible with the Widex. The Widex is using the Widex fit rationale and tulip domes and I changed the Philips to the Fit4speech (open bass domes) without any REM yet and standdard settings from the NAL2 that Costco had set up with REM. I found the Fit4speech to be much more comfortable for me and is similar but not the same as the Widex rationale.

I can make a special program for transport noise. I did have the transport program installed in the Widex and it did not help at all I don’t understand how my hearing aids can turn noise into this trashy bacon frying loud sound, overwhelming all other sounds, all the while still giving the me the original noise which was not that offensive to begin with. I love the Widex for live music (guitar playing) but hate the Widex for noise. Mtn biking with the Widex is out of the question and will wear the Philips for now. I’m on the fence about keeping the Widex but my net cost was only $1500. with insurance and can’t duplicate the music performance of the widex with the Philips.

The WS folks at HearUSA tend to call the Philips old tech compared to Widex but I have to say unless these HA are defective in some way (will ask the audi to put them in the test box), I am not impressed with what they do to noise and Phlips 9040 for me is way ahead of Widex in this regard. I think the 9030’s are about the same never an issue on the freeway like the Widex. Music…the Widex wins by far!

[fbacher1]

Here’s a good one. My air cleaner makes that bacon noise so I decided to run a dB meter on it. Amazing the noise went away! Hearing aids are still on. the noise is about 49 dB. So I turned my volume up to 7 in the hearing aid and ran the app again and that bacon frying noise just vanished. What’s going on? Is the dB somehow interfering with the HA in some “good” way?

Only one other app does this and it’s another dB meter called sonic tools that give me a the entire sound spectrum of the noise, which is centered around 500 hz and drops off at about 2K.

OK, yet another data point: When I use live listen on my iphone the noise just goes away the same way as it does with the app! After going back and forth for a bit it stopped doing this. Must have been lowering the volume for the HA somehow?
Totally confused and not sure if this means anything at all.