I’ve had the 9050’s for almost 2 months as a new HA user and see the Jabra is available now at Costco. .y hearing deficit is not great, but i do find the aids to be helpful. What I’ve seen regarding the Jabra is how well they supposedly do with voice in noise situations. I’m curious to hear if anyone has any experience with these 2 HA’s in this regard to be able to say which does a better job. It’s an issue that I can say i don’t feel a marked benefit from with the 9050’s. And maybe they’re all similar, but if one does a betteer job, i might make a change.
I made the change from the Jabra Enhanced Pro 20s to the 30s and after wearing the 30s for a month, the noise reduction is somewhat better with the new version, and the overall sound quality seems more natural. Like you, the 20s were my first sets of hearing aids. It could be that the 30s seem better because I’m becoming more accustomed to hearing aids. I was originally fitted in December 2024. Also, I have a mild to moderate high frequency hearing deficit and I can still hear okay without them. I haven’t tried the Phillips 9050, so I can’t speak directly to your question, but can only give you a comparison from my own experience.
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If using open domes, then expect some improvement. However, when using open domes, you are bypassing much of what the Jabra 30 can do with hearing-in-noise situations.
I believe Flyboybob is using open domes, so his impressions will probably give you a good idea if you are using open domes.
I believe he stated that the beam focusing in the Jabra app was helpful. So that may be something to consider.
One thing you might try is to experiment with a closed dome if you are using an open dome currently.
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Do you trust your Costco fitter?
Mine seems very good and spent a lot time making sure our Jabra Pro 30s were set up well for both my wife and I.
We were facing a similar question we went in about a month ago. We weren’t sure whether to go with Jabra Pro 20s or Philips 9050s. He said said they had just got the Jabra Pro 30s which he thought would suit us best.
He already preferred the Jabra’s which felt he could get better results with for most people and he said the Pro 30s were definitely an improvement over the Pro 20’s. So far we have been happy (but maybe we would have been happy with the Phillips 9050s?)
He is the senior person in the hearing aid department at the location we went to and seems well respected by his other customers and colleagues.
So I would ask the person who fitted your hearing aids their thoughts. They may also let you trial the Pro 30s (at least in the store).
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I do have open domes now. It sounds like closed domes could give a better result with voice in noise? True for any HA?
I don’t know the difference between open and closed, in terms of when one is more appropriate than the other etc. I’ll have to look into that to see which option is better for me overall.
I hadn’t heard or considered a trial walk around with a new pair of aids. That could be a way to go. Thanks.
I have tried both and currently have the 30’s. They do quite well in noise. I have the original Enhance Pro aids from 3 years ago and speech in noise is much better with these new aids. I cant even use the hear in noise program on my original pro’s because speech gets reduced right along with the background noise. These 30’s seem to reduce the background noises while not reducing speech from those close by. I was at a restaurant tonight and kept them in the speech in noise program and was impressed with how well i could hear my wife yet not hear the all the background noises. I changed to the all around program and the outdoor program and couldn’t belive how amplified those background noises were in comparison. Clearly they are on to something with this dnn/AI assist. Are they worth trading in? Not sure how happy you are with those 9050’s. I demo’d them for about half an hour and had them adjust some settings but just couldn’t get the sharper and more crisp sound from them compared to the Jabra’s. Same with the Rexton’s. I have severe to profound loss and really like how the Jabra’s help me with word comprehension over the others. But others i know would disagree and say the Jabra’s are to sharp or tinny sounding. So its really dependent on your individual loss and the sound you prefer. But its probably worth going in and foing a demo woth them before your 6 month trial is up on the 9050’s. My Costco has been great about letting me demo all of their aids. I had purchased the Pro 20’s last year but didnt hear much improvement over the originals so i returned them within a few months. Glad i did because these 30’s are definitely better. Not night and day difference but worth the $1650 and i now have a good pair of back ups if ever needed.
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Thanks, I will probably give the 9050’s a bit more time before looking at the Jabras. Since I’ve only had them a couple months i want to give my brain the time to adapt fully to HA’s. I guess they ramp up the full effect of their settings automatically over the first couple months anyhow, so I’m still probably getting that happening too.
The idea of a trial with the Jabras at some point is a good one 
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Kgilbertsen,
Since you have had your 9050’s for 2 months already, I would encourage you to check with Costco to get the recent Phillips 9050 software update. The update did improve things a little bit, but more importantly, I just had Costco (last week) update my “levels”. Not sure what the right term is here, but the Costco fitter said they typically set the HA levels at a “low” level so that a person (and their brain) can get used to the HAs.
A second visit can be used to make adjustments to those levels. In my case, I was setting the 9050s to General level 4 in the app, and after Costco adjustments, I am getting similar performance at level 0 in the app. In addition, they boosted the response level for human speech, so that helps as well. Oh, they also changed my domes to closed domes to let the 9050s do their thing.
I can say that after several months, I hugely miss these HAs when I don’t have them in the ears, remarkable improvement over my previous HAs (different brand).
On a related topic, some Costco specialists are golden (you can’t have mine! 
), some not so much.
While I didn’t try the Jabra pro 30, I did try for 2 months the pro 20, and was very disappointed overall. I found that the 20s seem to boost objectionable noise along with speech, even with the Noise setting (used in restaurants). Was it the HAs or the settings, I probably will never know for certain.
Good luck.
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I was just in to see my fitter last Monday and i dont think there was an update done. The app shows up to date, but it’s shown that all along. What’s your version #?
When i first got the aids the fitter said the ‘levels’ were at 80% and would gradually move to 100% over a 2 month period of time. Is this what you’re talking about? I’ve occasionally cranked the volume up to 2 but not so much lately, I’m thinking because of the levels climbing on their own…?
I do find them to be helpful, but I think I will at least see about doing the trial with the new Jabras, maybe towards the end of August. Then I’ll have given the 9050’s and my brain a decent chunk of time to get to know each other… 
Yes to both questions. Hearing aid manufactures are spending a great deal of effort to improve our ability to hear in noisy situations
When we use open domes, we are letting background noise come through the opening in the dome. Thus, the hearing aid AI can’t filter out the noise that is being bypassing very well.
Open domes do have some benefit. One, music generally sounds better since music can bypass the hearing aid processing, and two you don’t get the occlusion issue that you get with closed domes.
Closed domes have their benefit too. One, hearing-in-noise is better since the hearing aid AI can do it’s thing, and two streaming is significantly better, since you don’t get the sound/bass leakage out of the opening in a open dome.
Molds with venting tries to meet the two domes in the middle, reducing the occlusion issues, gaining a better hearing-in-noise benefit, but retaining some of the natural sound that would come in when using open domes.
Molds with venting do have some issues too. One, some folks are allergic to the material; two, the molds are more fragile; and three, they cost a little more.
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The updated firmware on my 9050s is 1.2.1. Like yours, the app showed that it was up to date prior to the Costco updating. Strange. The updating took about 10 minutes or so while in their office.
Well, sorta. I was not told that the levels would move up by themselves. While you are at a “2”, I manually moved mine to a “4”. As I wanted a bit more volume for voices, it prompted me to go back to Costco. I forget what test they did, but ended up with improved volume at level “0”, so I have room to grow if necessary.
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Thanks for your great explanation. I’m guessing most people like me with mild deficits get open domes to start?
Yes, unless they have a strong preference for streaming, often take phone calls in noisy situations or just plain often visit noisy places.
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I’ll confirm that next time i see my fitter, but she’s said it twice. With everything else these aids can do, ramping up levels on their own doesn’t seem hard to believe…
Just a datapoint: I was recently fitted with the 9050s at Costco and (as a new HA user) my impression was “good, not great”.
At my two-week follow-up visit I gave the person a list of things I’d noticed, such as “the voice-in-noise” program wasn’t great, and watching TV the voices were still muddy, but if I put my thumbs in my ears for a second (so that I was only hearing what comes through the HAs) it was much better.
She replaced the voice-in-noise program with the “automobile” program - MUCH better in background noise. Also switched me to closed domes for a trial, and the difference is night-and-day. Like, magical
$.02
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Having hearing aids initially at 80% and having them gradually increase to 100% is fairly standard for people new to hearing aids. If the wearer is used to wearing HAs, the initial setting is 100%, but this will sound too loud for someone who hasn’t worn hearing aids before. It takes a little time to adjust to hearing all the sounds that have been missing.
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To check the firmware version of your Philips 9050 aids in the Hearlink App, tap the “Hearing aids” icon at the bottom of the screen. In the next screen, you will see an option labeled “Hearing Aid Updates.” When you tap on this option, the following screen will display the current firmware versions of your hearing aids.
Re: volume settings, is your “Remember Volume Setting” enabled to start at the volume you last used? On the “Hearing aids” screen, there is an option for “Hearing Aid Settings.” When you select this, you will find a feature called “Remember Volume Setting.” If this is turned on (indicated by the green toggle), your hearing aids will return to the last volume level you set when you turn them off, so they start at the same volume the next time you use them.
I use an iPhone, and this is with the iOS app, but I assume the options are the same in the Android app.
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Thanks for that information Goldfish. Now my ha’s go back to the volume i last set them. I love this place.
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Interesting. I’ll have to remember to ask about those changes. Thanks
Do you know the latest firmware version?