LE Audio and the Future of Hearing

So you’re confident Apple will come to the LE Audio party?

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Yes, why do you think Mac division of Apple didn’t use MFI protocol to stream audio?

Mac is a open standard based computer such as USB, POSIX//Unix, and Bluetooth.

Also, Apple have been involved in LE Audio protocol solution. this is a win for Apple because other devices can use Apple version of LE audio interface, Low energy Audio is apple way of lowering power consumption of their computer/phones/tablets, they don’t want some high drain radio wrecking havoc on their core product lowering battery life…

Apple is bringing LE audio to their earbud / headpone because they aren’t going to keep using the BT Classic solution for their earbud/ headphones to make room for even smaller earbud that they envision and BT classic is definitely a limiting factor in their effort for longer battery life and other limitation like phonak is struggling to solve with their SWORD 3.0 chip…

Apple brought Beats by Dr. Dre company and makes Beats headphones/earbuds as well. Those are targeted for both Android and IOS devices

Source: Bluetooth SIG

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Interesting read: Nothing really new. Basic takeaway is that it’s going to take quite awhile to become widespread and that it doesn’t work with “lossless” codecs. Bluetooth LE Audio might not be the winner we all think it is - Android Authority

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I thought the iPhone & MFi hearing aids have been doing Bluetooth LE with multiple audio streams for over 10 years. They could not legally use the Bluetooth LE name unless it was sanctioned by the Bluetooth SIG.

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Big difference between Bluetooth LE and Bluetooth LE Audio. Apple has been using their proprietary version of LE Bluetooth (Made for iPhone) for years. LE Audio is a universal Bluetooth standard.

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So it was proprietary but they licensed the Bluetooth LE name??

I don’t know if licensed is the correct term.(It may be, just don’t know) Many hearing aids and phones used Bluetooth LE but just for data streams (like for controlling hearing aids via an app), but Apple developed it for streaming and called it MFi. Bluetooth LE Audio goes way beyond what Apple did.

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Actually, BT LE is the core spec, is a radio transport mechanism, not a protocol, and they can do wtf they want to build on it…

Apple sponsors Bluetooth SIG as one of the biggest corporate members companies. SIG is open to any company that makes the product and they have to conform to the BT core spec. if they don’t they will be blacklisted by the member companies,

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It’s taken a while, but the opening weeks have made it clear that 2023 is set to be the year of wireless Hi-Res Audio and LE Audio connectivity – at least where new headphones are concerned.

Coming hot on the heels of the incredibly well-specced, yet competitively priced Earfun Air Pro 3, we’re now seeing the start of what looks set to be a deluge of headphones that support the LC3 codec.

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Yeah about time,couldn’t have come quick enough! This whole LE Audio has got me excited,this is the perfect excuse as I’ll have to update all my audio equipment now.

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I think Bluetooth 5.4 might have been released in the last few hours. I don’t think there’s anything new that will impact LE Audio, but someone who knows what they’re talking about might like to confirm.

From https://www.bluetooth.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2301_5.4_Tech_Overview_FINAL.pdf

Periodic Advertising with Responses (PAwR)
PAwR is a new Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) logical transport that provides a way to perform energyefficient, bi-directional, communication in a large-scale one-to-many topology.

Encrypted Advertising Data
This new feature provides a standardized approach to the secure broadcasting of data in
advertising packets.

LE GATT Security Levels Characteristic
Devices may now indicate the security mode and level required for all their GATT functionality to be
available using a new GATT characteristic called LE GATT Security Levels.

Advertising Coding Selection
The Host can now specify which of two supported long range coding options are used with LE
extended advertising.

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5.4 only affects mostly IoT devices, i do not see it beneficial to hearing devices
See:

“two new features that together enable secure, bi-directional communication between a wireless access point (AP) and thousands of very-low power end nodes.”

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Interesting, looks like Oticon has been working on BT LE Audio for a while now, I’m surprised it wasn’t rolled out to the Mores already.

On a side note, that’s a significantly larger development team than I expected.

Since this is an English language forum, here is the translated link.

https://simplyjob-com.translate.goog/452497/oticon-a-s/open-source-bluetooth-le-audio-controller-development-senior-firmware-developer?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp

Weird, my browser must have auto-translated it, since it was in English for me. :person_shrugging:

It was already in english for me. I don’t think it affects the development of LE Audio on the More S chip platform. This have been development for years now…

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This thread has been going approximately 3 years now folks, since LE Audio was first discussed for hearing aids… That’s a long time in hearing aid development, we will most likely still be discussing it in another 3 years time, the OP was @d_Wooluf, it has become a bit of a never ending Saga, and the initial anticipation & excitement has somewhat waned, here’s hoping the wait is worth it… Cheers Kev :upside_down_face:

Ok the cookie acceptance pop up was Danish.

So, the Zephyr Project. Oticon More is in this list:

https://www.zephyrproject.org/products-running-zephyr/

Current version is 3.2. Release plan: Release Plan · GitHub

Various bits of LE Audio are planned for 3.3 and 3.4. We can all hop on Github and watch Oticon’s LE Audio development unfold in real time. It doesn’t sound like it’s going to happen tomorrow. Is there anyone out there that can put all of this in perspective?

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