Hi,
- My audiogram is very similar to yours, but age related.
- I have used various aids since 2007 and have had others for shorter trial periods.
- Up until this year, the all from 2) above have been at best borderline helpful … untill
- Current setup 3 months: Phonak Audeo B90 312 with Phonak Compilot ll and TVlink ll - A quantum improvement.
So responding to your specific points, from my personal experience with this setup:
- Hearing: these have been an ear opener (excuse the pun) for me compared to previous aids, even with the standard 1st pass programming. The Phonak multiple environment adaptation is amazing!
- Specific programming: Like you I am in a similar environment (also ME) with a/c’s and especially traffic noise: a bit of judicious tweaking has controlled all of that.
- Streaming: yes the streamer is a bit of a faff, but the sound quality is excellent and the functionality easy to use. I switch between TV, IPad, Iphone and yes… MacMini easily. It’s all bluetooth (which in itself is at times a flaky technology). The TV link needed only if your TV does not have Bluetooth.
Ponts to consider:
- The new current Phonak model is the Marvel (“M”). This does all the bluetooth without a streamer, though you will need your iPhone to manage it.
- Why did I get the end of line B90’s rather than the new M90 - Only because there was a wait till the M90s became available and my current aids were next to useless. As pure hearing aids there isn’t much difference between them, and the clincher, I got the B90’s at an amazingly cheap price second hand. The intention being they would be a stop gap till the M90s became available. However given my overall satisfaction with these B90’s I very much doubt I will “upgrade” any time soon. Especially as they cost iro $4,000 locally (my B90’s and all the bits came to <$1,000).
- I was so happy with the B90’s that I bought the programming interface ICube ll and now tinker myself with my wonderful audiologist as a backstop safety net. (Windows software in Parallels on OS10 Mojave … not for the faint hearted!)
So in summary, from personal experience, your audiogram, and your specific needs I would recommend the Phonak aids, the latest M90’s should tick all your boxes, the older B90’s with streamer bought secondhand a close second only in that it needs a streamer. There is a version of the B90, the B90 Direct which offers streamer free streaming (direct bluetooth) but according to my Audiologist compromises on some of the pure audiology performance so never tried.
BTW there are lower spec aids in the range 30, 50, 70, which are cheaper and may be adequate for you but no experience with those. Your audiologist would advise. Interestingly the M90’s trial aids are configurable to the different performance levels in the fitting software so it is easy to trial the different performance levels (and costs) without having to fit new trial aids.