MyMusic disappointment

[flashb1024]

@SamuelH

What’s gone wrong?

What’s gone wrong is Oticon’s dim witted perception of what High Fidelity music should sound like!
The original Music program was actually quite pleasant, with some minor tweaks, but the geniuses strove for some marketing hype, and killed it.

@3dslides

It seems to tamp down some sounds, rather than add anything to the detail.

Absolutely!
Oticon published a White Paper on MyMusic, and claimed to incorpoate the “Harmon Curve” to great success on a test group.
Little detail was given on what sources of music were used or the level of expertise of the subjects.
here’s a link to the article.

The solution is to have your audi modify the MyMusic program by adding some gain in the upper mids, and any other frequencies you find lacking.
Bringing a good music source, and a pair of good Over Ear headphones can really help during the fitting.
It took close to a year for me to be able to accept MyMusic, but it can be done!!

[Louie]

Tell your Aud to check the ‘Power Bass’ setting. If it’s too high, it can often cause streamed audio to sound muddy/boomy. This setting is found in the End Fitting → Accessories → Phone tab of the fitting software.

[Volusiano]

@Louie

Tell your Aud to check the ‘Power Bass’ setting. If it’s too high, it can often cause streamed audio to sound muddy/boomy. This setting is found in the End Fitting → Accessories → Phone tab of the fitting software.

I personally like the High value selection on the Power Bass myself. On these tiny little receivers, there can never be enough bass to make things sound muddy or boomy for me. Streaming music to hearing aids is always too tinny for my taste overall, because it’s not physically possible to faithfully reproduce the bass to the accurate level it needs to be from these tiny receivers. But hey, each to his own. I guess.

What I gather is that MyMusic sucks to some people because they overcompensate to give the appearance that there’s good bass by taking away some of the mids/mid-highs volume to give the perception of more bass overall. But they can’t fool the discerning ears because there can never be thumping bass delivered by the tiny receivers in the first place, so there’s no perceived of better bass, but in its place, more perception of lacking the mids and mid-highs because they took it away.

The screenshot below from their MyMusic whitepaper pretty much shows how MyMusic is different than the original legacy Music program → they took away the mids and mid-highs and bump up the lows and the highs. I guess the participants from their study noticed the bumps in the lows and highs and considered MyMusic superior, but the more discerning ears noticed the suppression/lack in the mid and mid-highs and consider MyMusic inferior to the legacy Music program.

There is A LOT of information in the mids and mid-highs for a lot of different variety of sounds. By dampening it, you can make a lot of critical sounds seem to become dull or get drowned out by other less critical sounds.

[3dslides]

@flashb1024

The solution is to have your audi modify the MyMusic program by adding some gain in the upper mids, and any other frequencies you find lacking.
Bringing a good music source, and a pair of good Over Ear headphones can really help during the fitting.
It took close to a year for me to be able to accept MyMusic, but it can be done!!

Actually, music sounds pretty darn good to me with just the regular program. So I’m not sure I want to spend fitting appointments trying to ‘perfect’ the MyMusic settings when I don’t have a problem to begin with. But thanks for the advice; I’ll keep it in mind.

[Volusiano]

@3dslides

Actually, music sounds pretty darn good to me with just the regular program.

That has always been the intention of Oticon to accommodate most listening situations with just the main default program, including listening to music. There’s nothing wrong with sticking with the default program to listen to music. I’m perfectly happy with it as well.

The main thing I notice between the default program and the legacy Music program (which is not the same as MyMusic) is that there’s more “openness” in the Music program (because noise suppression is removed, among other things, like maybe less compression as well), but really not to the point where it makes a big enough reason to choose one over the other. It boils down to personal preferences.

[e1405]

@Volusiano

Streaming music to hearing aids is always too tinny for my taste overall, because it’s not physically possible to faithfully reproduce the bass to the accurate level it needs to be from these tiny receivers. But hey, each to his own. I guess

Hi @Volusiano! Have you had the chance to listen to the audio samples comparing some of the newest hearing aids (posted here)? I don’t think the difference for music between Phonak Lumity and Oticon More is only due to hardware/receiver. I suppose the catch is in the fitting algorithm, which makes me wonder if that would be possible to replicate ;). BTW, I think the Lumity performed even better than the AirPods Pro 2 for music!

[e1405]

My curiosity got the best of me one more time! lol

Here I have input the same audiogram, chose power domes in the “acoustic” setting, and got screen shots of the initial music programs for Oticon More (MyMusic) and Phona Lumity (Streaming Media Music + Mic).

Phona Lumity (Streaming Media Music + Mic):

Oticon More (MyMusic):

[e1405]

I think I figured where part of the magic is coming. Please, Phoank users correct me where I am wrong… Phonak Target shows two music programs (neat!): one for live music; and one for streaming music. As seen in the screen shots below, Lumity boosts the low frequencies in the “media music” program. Again, neat!

Music Program (live):

Media Music Program (streaming):

[Volusiano]

@e1405

BTW, I think the Lumity performed even better than the AirPods Pro 2 for music!

I guess we have to agree to disagree here.

I really doubt any hearing aid can deliver the kind of full bass that a good earbud or a good set of headphones can deliver. It’s just simple physics. The hearing aid receiver uses a tiny balanced armature to generate the sound while the AirPods Pro 2 use a much larger size dynamic diaphragm speaker design that can generate much more low frequency bass power and performance than the receiver’s balanced armature can.

The better performance in music that you’re talking about may be true only if you totally disregard the bass response and performance between the 2 types of speakers and focus solely on the audiogram accommodation across the board that can be more accurately reproduced in the mids and highs by the hearing aids simply because they ARE designed solely as hearing aids.

With the exception of the Phonak new Active Vent receiver design, pretty much all other HA mfgs use the same balanced armature design with the same low bass performance limitation. The Phonak Active Vent design cannot really match the bass performance of a speaker diaphragm design either. It’s only designed to be able to open or close its vent dynamically as commanded by the hearing aid to block out the noise and also to minimize sound leakage in situations that call for it, and to open up to minimize occlusion and let more sound in in other situations that call for it.

The first screenshot below is the diaphragm of the AirPods earbud, and the second screenshot is a picture of the balanced armature design of a typical receiver. Of course the sizes in the screenshot are not to scale. The speaker diaphragm is much bigger in size (as it can afford to be because it doesn’t have to fit inside the ear canal) compared to the balanced armature (that has to be small enough to fit inside the ear canal.

[al11]

I have L90s with ActiveVent and do a lot of music streaming for many hours a day. I also have AirPods Pro 2, Will be getting custom molds soon. When I plug my ears with fingers the music is remarkably good. Anticipating that the molds will sound like that. Can’t say that the music is better than with AirPod Pros but is very satisfying. Best music is still found with my high end over the ears headphones with tube amps.

[al11]

Should add that I have been streaming Bluesound Node MQA music via my Roger On and that is great sounding . Maybe the frequency range is better with the Roger system as compared to bluetooth.

[e1405]

@Volusiano and @al11: I would like to clarify that I am not comparing what I hear from an actual AirPod Pro 2 or Phonak Lumity. I am just reporting my impression of the audio samples in that link I posted above (that seems to be down now), following the instructions I was given (no hearing aids, good headphones, normal volume). At this point I do not own an AirPod Pro 2 (I own the older version) and wear Oticon More

I think you both point out, perhaps, a limitation of that sort of samples: are they able to fully capture the music experience of the real thing in our ears, pumping low frequencies all over our skulls?

[Volusiano]

Thanks for the clarification, @e1405 . Yeah, depending on the audio samples used for the comparison, they may not cover the full range of audible sounds.

[SpudGunner]

@Volusiano

they may not cover the full range of audible sounds.

@Volusiano: Perhaps this is why my Zamphir CDs sound like they are missing some notes (or even full bars) during some songs, especially at the climax of the tune?

[Volusiano]

Haha, good one, @SpudGunner . Your Zamphir CD can sure do away with the fine attributes of the AirPods’s thundering bass for sure.

[silvys]

Hello Samuel, I have the Oticon More 1, and I am astonished that your having such problems??
Can you post or send a screenshot of your settings & your hearing Test?
I myself Stream and Listen a High end setup Atmos and it (they) work perfectly.

[e1405]

I crafted a new music program for my Oticon More 1 based on the Phonak Lumity. I used NAL-NL2, which seems to be the closest option Genie 2 offers to Phonak’s proprietary fitting formula. Then I tweaked the frequencies I know that need to be lowered a bit. This early version is already considerably better than all my previous experiences with MyMusic. It sounds great for both streamed music and my two guitars.

As it is often stressed on this forum, much of hearing improvement comes from good implementation. I guess the same goes for manufacturers and their “modeling” choices (fitting formula, compression rates, gain targets, MPO, etc.). I will be sure to peruse other’s companies fitting software from now on .

[prodigyplace]

@e1405

NAL-NL2

My understanding is most all proprietary formulas start with that as a basis b

[user1205]

I have Oticon Real 3 and MyMusic is great for me I can hear the upper register like I used to 30 years ago.

[user1205]

The MyMusic enables the full music Dinamics and Frequency range of the music.

It has nothing to do with ones Likes/Dislikes of the music.