Is it unusual for one hearing aid battery to have a lot less power left than the other?

Hearing Aid Batteries
#17

I doubt that it’s due to a difference between the OPN 1 vs OPN 2. I suspect that it’s more due to the different types of battery you and I use. I primarily use the Costco Kirkland brand batteries. I’m guessing that this battery brand does not die abruptly toward the end of its life while maybe your battery brand does.

Also, just to clarify, the low battery warning is basically a 3-chime warning. If I keep on using it without replacing it, once in a while (every 5 or 10 or 15 minutes? I’m not sure) I continue to get the 3-chime warning. Then at the end, I get a distinctly different tone sequence signaling that the OPN is now inoperable because there’s not enough juice in the battery to keep it going anymore.

I wonder if you ever got the 3-chime warning, THEN the distinct shutting-down tone sequence signifying that the battery is completely out of juice? If so, how far apart are these 2 tones?

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#18

You take the batteries out before you put them in the HA dryer? I open the battery door and but the aids in the dryer with the batteries in the open door. Am I doing this all wrong? I thought the instructions said you could leave the batteries in or out. I just open the door so they power off.

#19

I just receive 1 set of tones. It’s three descending tones that’s it and dead. That’s also what the audi demonstrated to me with the OPN programing app (Genie 2).

#20

No, you’re not doing it wrong.

I originally started doing it when I was having problems with moisture getting into my HAs and shorting out the batteries. By removing the batteries, I felt I was making sure everything got dried out over night. A set of Ear Gears solved the moisture problem, but I kept on removing them. I also hit on the idea that by switching the batteries every day I might even out the battery usage. Now it’s habit and I don’t even think about it.

I keep one of those HA tools with the magnetic tip in my dryer, so it makes removing them easy.

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#21

even your audiogram affect your battery. more loss and more amplification + features more battery consumtoin. i have asymetrical loss left high and right less left always become low battery early. my is Siemens working only upto 22 mph on max.

#22

If you look at the Genie 2 picture below, you’ll see that there’s a Pre-Warning option for the Battery Low Indicator. On mine it’s selected so I get a warning plenty of time before the OPN shuts down. I suspect you only have the Change Battery Warning selected, and therefore never get the pre-warning like I do. If you want it turned on, just ask your audi to set it next time for you.

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#23

Interesting. I have worse loss on my right, but my left seems to wear out batteries slightly more quickly. I wonder if there’s some difference between the computer chips regarding energy efficiency. I know some computer cpus are “binned” to separate out the more efficient ones.

#24

Holy cow - you buy those things at Tiffanys? You can get them in bulk at Coscto for about 17 cents each…

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#25

Over 10 years battery life has been consistent.
Early on I would wait until both batteries went dead. As this happened within a couple of hours I stopped worrying about them

Now I watch duration and change them when one beeps.
I get 3 days with KS6 312 batteries and I have clocked the Resound Forte with 13 batteries at 5.5 days.
That’s one good way to judge. If the 13s drop below 5.5 days I know something is wrong.

#26

I’ve had too many experiences of batteries sounding the “going dead!” alert at awkward moments. Over the years I’ve learned about what the average life span is; now I routinely replace both batteries every Sunday and Thursday. And that works fine. The 312s I use for my Resounds cost so little at Costco it isn’t worth it to wait until they are stone dead.

#27

Does high frequency gain take more power as my right side always dies in the morning and then my left side dies in the evening of the same day?

I’ve started to change them every Monday so I don’t have to deal with changing batteries at work etc.

#28

I also have Oticon OPN and the iPhone battery meter consistently shows the left side with less battery life than the right, even though my right ear has more loss, yet the two tend to “die” at very close to the same time. I’ve stopped worrying about it.

#29

Yes, the feedback manager is doing more work controlling HF gain. It’s common for the side with proportionately more HF gain and/or larger venting to run the battery down first.

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#30

Okay I swappeb the batteries as @TexasBob does. This morning the batteries were left aid 50% and right aid 40%. So it does seem like it’s the battery and not the aid. It also seems likethere isn’t such a drastic differ between the poer level in each aid as I’ve been experiencing. I think I will try removing the batteries before putting the aids in the dryer.

@Volusiano That would have to be the reason you get the warnings prior to the go dead chimes. I will ask my audi to turn those on.

Now I don’t know if the Speech Rescue is turned on or not, have to ask Audi. What I want to know is does that function help to clarify those words/letters your audiogram indicates you have problems understanding or what is it’s purpose? I find sometimes my brain still has trouble understanding some speech. Also would that cause a big draw on battery power?

#31

I have Speech Rescue on and it greatly helps me hear the “s” and “sh” sounds better. I can also hear cricket sounds now while I couldn’t hear it without Speech Rescue. And a lot of the mild electronic chimes from the fridge or alarm clocks, etc.

There was some literature from Oticon before the OPN was introduced suggesting that Speech Rescue requires some functionality of the older Oticon models to be turned off because there’s not enough processing power to do everything in the older hardware platform. But with the new Velox hardware platform developed just for the OPN, I don’t see any more mention of sacrificing some other functionality to enable Speech Rescue. I think that it’s because the Velox platform has enough processing power to handle everything, Speech Rescue included.

As for whether Speech Rescue eats up more battery life, I doubt it because based on my own observation, I still consistently get about 5 days of battery life before and after I turned Speech Rescue on.

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#32

That’s good to know. Thanks.

#33

didn’t know that! might consider when I upgrade too (going for the 13PP)

#34

Just changed both batteries at work to the Duracells. Same thing, left aid is already at 80% and right at 100%. That must be some powerful programming in the left aid. Switching the batteries daily has gotten me a week out of them, so I’ll keep switching daily. I’ll also try the Costco batteries…as soon as they correct the screwup in my member number and finally get me a membership card. :confounded:

#35

More important, do that still last about as long? Reporting remaining battery life is highly inaccurate with HA batteries. They tend to remain full power until right at the end. The 80% might be a minor hardware issue in the aid itself.

#36

IôI inserted the fresh new batteries this morning. The iPhone accesibility thing says right now I have 40% left in left aid and 50% in right. Strange when they were new this morning. Maybe it’s some algorithm of what you have left for the day and not the overall power left. If it were overall power left, I wouldn’t get two days use, much less 6 or so days.

I’ve been reading about the zPower rechargeables and have read they’re not meeting the amount of time they’re supposed to last on a charge. Just keep an extra set of batteries with you just in case, I guess.