Interesting. So I could potentially use the receivers and moulds from my Reals? I have the tool to switch them over if so.
I am waiting for my new moulds to come at the moment which are skeleton ones as I find the canal lock ones make my ears ache after a few hours and obviously with Oticon Intents these are now embedded. And also have updated speaker wires too which are different to those I had with the Reals.
It is my understanding from the data that I read that the new receivers use a different type of connector and isn’t compatible with older Oticon aids. The new receivers have an 8 wire connection system.
Chuck is right. The new receiver is not compatible with aids using the old type passive receivers at all. The new receiver has a communication port that talks with the Intent. The old receiver is just a passive connection with essentially speaker wires in the harness only. The Real cannot make use of the new receiver either because it doesn’t have a communication port, just a passively wired connector.
Ah okay. Fair enough! I’m so happy with these Intents. Currently sitting in a very noisy wine bar and I can really hear my wife, who is hearing across the table clearly and she is struggling!
I have the same issue
Paradise P90R’s with Power Domes.
Size is the key for me. If I use what the hearing instrument specialist says M (left) and L (right) I vary day to day…feel like I’m chasing my tail.
Right now I’m using Large (Left) and Large (Right) I wish I could get these things working.HA’s I mean.
OK, this was a great video to explain how the quick (2-3 min!) ACT test can be used to better set up my Oticon Intents … IF the clinic’s audiometer has the capability.
I can see how the results of this test could’ve helped set up my Phonak Lumity Life aids for that matter. I’ve continued to have a challenge understanding speech in NOISY places even if I have the dedicated “Speech in Loud Noise” program activated.
Today I had my audi set up a “Mute” function on my aids, and that makes a noticeable and amazing difference when using my remote Roger ON iN mic. I’ll be eager to test that out more at home during tonight’s TV viewing and in a noisy restaurant.
Thanks for sharing the link to Dr Cliff’s video!
It appears they do more:
The new miniFit Detect delivers gain accuracy within 1dB, providing up to 57% more precise gain compared to previous speaker units. So, yes, that would affect sound clarity, too.
So @cvkemp Chuck that’s true, and @ToriNi , you are getting better sound, as well
They are available on amazon,LOL!! 75$ per!
I think the key word is “up to” 57% more precise gain. That doesn’t really imply automatically that the old receivers are notoriously not accurate. While they can’t self calibrate, the fact is that the old style receivers have faithfully served countless hearing aid brands and models for years so far with very little issues. At least I don’t recall too many threads on this forum, if actually any, complaining about the old style receivers being notoriously unreliable or inaccurate. It makes me wonder that if self calibrated receivers have been a necessity all along, why only Oticon has chosen to do this so far and why wait until now?
Also, more precise gain doesn’t necessarily equal to better sound clarity. More precise gain would relate to sound “accuracy”, but not necessarily sound “clarity”. Sound “clarity” is just too muddy of a term that can be clearly qualified. Who knows, if the old style receivers deliver more gain than intended, a louder gain might be perceived as better “clarity” over less gain, despite having a lesser gain actually meaning more accurate performance. I would not jump the gun to interpret more accuracy as more clarity always.
Are you saying that the old receivers are on Amazon for $75 per unit? I’ve been able to buy 2 on eBay for $12 for both before. Prices can fluctuate. One can easily point to a higher price as one can also point to a lower price if one is looking. At least they’re available on Amazon and eBay. Not sure if the new receiver type for the Intent is going to be widely available on Amazon or eBay or not.
All I know is that almost every user review I have read are users that have compared the INTEND to Real or More aids, and everyone of them talk about the clarity in noisy environments, and better wind noise prevention. I will not find out for myself for a couple of months, but i fully intend to make my comparisons.
My Real1 aids are some better in wind, and noisy environments, but I don’t recognize any difference in quiet environments or while streaming. But MyMusic is a lot better in my Real1 aids. Where i struggle the most is sudden noise, say only of my barking dogs starts barking without me being alert to that happen both the More1and Real1 aids will destort the sound so bad my receivers will even vibrate.
My Intents win hands down in noisy environments in comparison with my Reals. I could hear word for word and did not get tired whereas my wife who is hearing did struggle! I even tried speech boost and it worked very well for me.
I streamed attending a conference online yesterday for seven hours and I still had 70% battery life so I was very impressed with the battery side of things too. Very refreshing not to have to keep constantly changing batteries as I was doing with my Reals.
So far, in reality, the Intents are definitely meeting the hype.
The Intent for all practical purposes has 2 more dB in noise attenuation compared to the Real. It’s been said that for every 1 dB of more noise attenuation, it translate to a 10% improvement in speech clarity.
However, it also depends on how your HCP up with the Real vs the Intent. For example, although the Real 1 has available up to 10 dB max attenuation for Difficult environment, but sometimes, depending on your level of hearing loss, the default max attenuation for Difficult environment may be set to a lower max available value by Genie 2.
Take the example of my personal hearing loss (you can look at my audiogram attached to my profile avatar), the Real 1 setting would only default to 6 dB of max noise attenuation (although the max available attenuation for the Real is 10 dB). But if I switch over to the Intent 1, Genie 2 would assign a default max attenuation of 8 dB (with 12 dB being the max available for the Intent 1). That is telling me that Oticon has decided that they can be more aggressive with max noise attenuation on the Intent as compared to the Real for the same audiogram profile.
In theory, you would be curious to wonder why they don’t just use the max available value for the Tier level of that model so that they could reap the most noise attenuation benefit? I think that’s because there’s a trade-off between the level of noise attenuation versus the naturalness of the sound scene. It could be that if the noise attenuation is set to be too aggressive, the speech component may stand out more amongst the noise, but sound quality of the speech component might suffer. On top of that, it also might suppress the non-speech sounds too much, therefore goes counter against the Oticon open paradigm.
Anyway, back to the topic at hand, apparently Oticon has improved the DNN 2.0 enough that they feel that they can set the Intent to be more aggressive with the max noise reduction (as compared to the Real) without sacrificing the kind of trade-off mentioned above. That’s why my Intent’s default of max NR is set to 8 dB on the Intent 1, but only 6 dB on the Real 1. This alone would give me a 20% improvement in speech in noise contrast already.
Now it also depends on how your HCP set up your Intent vs your Real as well. Like in my case, at default values, the Intent is already 2 dB better than the Real already. But if I decided to boost the Intent to 10 dB and leave the Real at its 6 dB default, then the difference is 4 dB better for the Intent. If I decide to max out the Intent at 12 dB, then the difference is a whopping 6 dB more NR for the Intent.
The point is that when comparing the Real vs the Intent speech in noise performance, it’d be worth observing how the settings for max noise reduction are set between the 2 models. If the max NR values are set to be the same between them and the Intent still beats the Real, then it’s apple to apple comparison and we can conclude that the Intent still beats the Real on something else (maybe the DNN 2.0) other than the max NR value. But if one model’s max NR setting is different than the other model’s max NR setting, then it’s now apple to orange comparison and the Intent may simply perform better than the Real for speech in noise simply because its max NR value has been set to a higher value than the Real’s value, that’s all.
From what i have gotten from the white papers, they are playing the balancing act between speech understanding and the surrounding sound of the environment, just like what you have said. They are hoping for a balance that gives the individual the speech understanding needed within completely removing the sounds around the individual. I love hiking and walking the forest. I need and want to be able to hear the environment for my own safety and enjoyment. The forest around here has lots of wildlife, including bear.
With my Real1 aids i still struggle in really noisy environments and also in meets where i cannot face everyone that maybe talking all at the same time. Also, it is like my aids lock onto a voice, say on the TV or someone talking out of turn and I cannot hear the person i need to hear. But i wonder how quickly the INTEND aids can lock onto a voice that I might turn to look at for that persons comment.
The beauty of the Intent can be summarized in the chart below. It’s the adaptability of the 4D sensor that can give the Intent the ability to fluctuate the SNR to afford the flexibility of maximizing the SNR when needed, but reducing it when not needed, to strike a good dynamic balance between high speech in noise performance, yet still give a perception of a more normal and balanced sound scene.
Without the 4D sensors, you just have the fixed black dotted line for the Real and the fixed blue dotted line for the Intent. Without the 4D sensors, there’s no wide variability of how the noise attenuation can be applied, because there’s no input available to guess the intent. But the 4D sensors make available the input to guess the intent, so the hearing aids no longer have to be conservative and is confined to tiptoeing the line in applying the noise attenuation. It basically opens up the field and lets the aids “go to town” on using the 4D sensors to adjust the noise attenuation dynamically as it sees fit.
How quickly can the Intent lock onto a voice when you turn and look at that person? I don’t see anywhere in the Oticon whitepaper that mentions this speed. I would surmise to say that it’s not a question of how fast it can lock on (after all, machines are VERY fast), but it’s a question of how fast Oticon WANTS IT TO BE to make things more realistic. For example, Oticon aids dynamically and constantly scans and analyze the sound scene 500 times a second to evaluate it to determine how noisy or quiet the environment is, then applies the appropriate level of noise reduction for it. But Oticon doesn’t constantly change the noise reduction level 500 times a second accordingly. It puts a “timer” on it and the scanned environment must be stable for at least 2 seconds before it adjusts the noise reduction for speech accordingly. I would guess the same would be applied here. And it makes sense that your head movement should settle down for a second or two before Oticon would want to react to it.
My other question that i just thought about. Another huge issue for me is sudden noise like a dog barking, I have 3 dogs two are extreme barkers. If i am expecting them to bark i can and do adjust for it, but sometimes they can have what i call a sudden unexpected bark that will drive my Real and More aids crazy. I have had then literally shutdown or even go into feedback. According to my audiologist and the Oticon rep it just happens too fast for the aids to have time to respond correctly. I have also had it to happen while my wife was cooking and set off the smoke detector. It really gets weird when one shurdown and the other one goes into massive feedback.
That has happened to me several times with both the More and Real aids.
I’m a little confused here, Chuck. I can understand if your More can’t react well to sudden sounds, but I thought that one of the hallmark differentiation for the Real is the introduction of the Sudden Sound Stabilizer (beside the Wind handling) as the 2 new features over the More. Do you know if it’s enabled, and set to a high enough value to see if it helps? Below is the screenshot of it and it has up to 5 possible values.
I’ve only heard positive reports about these 2 new features on the Real in this forum, sudden sound and wind handling.
Excellent.
This gives me hope.
The complaint we have is that we can’t understand speech in noisy environments. I’ve only had one very quick test in noise. That was during my most recent hearing test when I stated I hadn’t been tested in noise.
DL
DaveL
I really do not understand either but i am still have the issues with my two loud barkers, and the smoke detector. I am not sure if it is as bad as the More1 because I haven’t had the issues as often. I am slowly getting my two barkers trained due to bark collars. And the smoke detector hasn’t gone off since the last adjustment to my aids.
They are specifically stating they provide more precise gain compared to the older receivers.
Users that have posted on this forum have stated the Intents have better clarity than Reals, or Mores.
But hey, I make it a point to never argue with an engineer 
The Intent also has a frequency response of 80 Hz to 10KHz, which definitely puts them close to HiFi!
No, V, that’s for the new ones the Detect speakers, but I was wrong about amazon, the only place I found was here:
@flashb1024 Are you actually able to buy from MySecondEar? I tried but could not because there did not appear to be a way to purchase without a VAT number. In my case a member of this forum was kind enough to visit the store in Germany and mail what I needed to me in the US.
Could you ask that audi if it was the Audible Contrast Threshold test? That is the one Dr Cliff says takes only a few minutes, and yet it is invaluable in determining the optimum noise reduction for the aids so you can better comprehend speech.
