Oticon Real 1 - my experience

Hearing Aids
#1

I’ve had Oticon Real 1s for about three weeks. Before that I demo’d Oticon Mores for two weeks, and Phonak Lumitys for a week. Previously, I wore Phonak Audeo BR 90s that I got in 2017.

I almost purchased the Phonak Lumitys. The demo went quite well, especially for speech in noisy situations. What held me back was that I had each of my Phonak Audeos repaired, and never felt like the repaired aids had the same quality as they had previously, even though they are supposed to be essentially new after being repaired. I didn’t want another situation where I get maybe three years out of expensive hearing aids then have to live with sub-par ones. (It may have been a fitting issue as well.) So I went ahead and demo’d the Oticons.

The Lumitys and both Oticons are a significant improvement over my old Phonak Audeos. But I ultimately selected the Oticons for this reason: if I didn’t hear something with the Lumitys, I just missed it and that was that. With the Oticons, if I missed something, I felt like I could have caught it had I been paying attention. It’s a bit hard to describe. I’ve always had some interest in whether practicing listening would be helpful but the “I could have caught that if I’d been paying attention” feeling has prompted me to try it. I’ve started listen to at least a short podcast at the start of every day, and I think it helps.

I’ve seen a lot of discussions about noise and wind noise reduction here. Both the Oticons and Phonaks do well in windy conditions. With the Oticon Reals you can take them out and they don’t make any noise while you’re handling them, which is nice.

I’m not sensing a huge change from the Mores to the Reals. I think I would have been happy with the Mores as well.

I’ve had two instances with the Reals where the right HA lost the bluetooth connection with my phone and I’ve had to reset it to get it back. I think it might have happened after having the phone in my purse so I’ve been keeping it in an outside sleeve of the purse since then. Overall the bluetooth is pretty solid I can hear on the phone and people can hear me. The app much easier to connect to and use than Phonak’s. I disable bluetooth in the car because I find the ringing to be quite startling when driving.

Music with my old Audeos was much better; they used an external CommPilot II rather than direct bluetooth. However the improvement in ability to help me hear conversation more than makes up for it. I didn’t notice a difference in listening to music between the Lumitys, Mores, and Reals.

I am a candidate for a cochlear implant and would have pursued that option if I hadn’t seen a significant improvement. I don’t have any regrets about buying the Reals. I may still have to get CIs some day but am very happy with this solution for now.

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#2

That’s great to hear. I’m getting the Oticon Real 1 tomorrow in the miniRITE model. I assume that’s what you have too? I currently wear Oticon Opn PP BTE.

I trialled the More last month and there was a huge difference in clarity of speech and being able to hear speech without having to focus on the people speaking. Since they launched the Real model, I decided to get these instead due to the incremental improvements so looking forward to tomorrow!

I was considered for CI years ago on the NHS after a drop in my high frequencies but wasn’t deemed a candidate as I benefitted from hearing aids too much. I tend to agree even though audiologists over the years said I should go for CI.

But while I can still benefit from aids, I would rather continue using them as technology is improving all of the time. Just look at how small a hearing aid we can now wear with our type of loss!

For me, CI is the absolute last resort. I hope you continue to enjoy your Reals!

#3

Thanks for sharing. The reason there’s been a lot of talk about wind noise reduction about the Real is because it’s one of the two key new features that differentiate between itself and the More. The other is sudden sounds suppression (Oticon calls it “stabilizer”).

I know you mentioned that both the Oticons and the Phonak do well in windy conditions, but can you give some more comment on whether you think the Real handles with wind better than the More? Or do they perform about the same in wind for you? And what kind of wind have you been exposed to so far? Just a windy day? Or wind in your hair kind of situation like when riding a bike or a car with the windows down?

You didn’t mention if you notice whether the Real handles sudden sounds better than the More or not. But then maybe sudden sounds haven’t really been an issue for your types of environments anyway, so that’s OK. But if you do notice a difference in the sudden sound handling between the More and the Real and have an opinion about it, I’d like to hear what you think. Thanks.

Your comment about why you chose the Oticon is definitely in line with the philosophy of the Oticon open paradigm. If the aids make the sounds available for you to hear, then at least your brain hearing can decide on whether you want to hear a particular sound or ignore it, and you can train your brain to do the filtering. But if the aids doesn’t even present that sound for you to hear, then you don’t even have that choice to filter or not in the first place. But then there’s also nothing wrong with not wanting to have a choice to hear too many sounds or not because some folks would rather just not be bothered with too many sounds which would require their brain to do more work to focus and filter. It’s very much an individual choice and it looks like you made your individual choice there.

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#4

I currently am within the refund period with my More 1 and will exchange them for Real. A couple of times with these aids, and many times with my previous Rexton KS8, I have lost streaming connection with an aid. I think I found an easier way than re-pairing.

Settings->Accessibility->Hearing Devices->My Hearing Devices->click on your aids.
Turn off the streaming to each aid and turn back on again. Some Oticon users have found streaming to be more reliable without the Oticon app installed.

If you remove the Bluetooth pairing with your car you can possibly skip disabling Bluetooth.

#5

Yes, I got the miniRITE R. I’ve been wearing HAs a long time and they do just keep getting better and better. Good luck with your Reals!

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#6

EDIT: re sudden sounds, I ran the blender. The aids quickly reduced the volume, although it was still painfully loud. I didn’t try this with the Mores, but I think this is on par with how my old Phonaks handled loud noises.

I didn’t really notice an issue with the Mores in wind, so it’s hard to say. With the Reals, I went for a bike ride yesterday and had no problem either with wind sounds or with hearing my husband - we weren’t chatting much while biking but it still went well.

Sudden sounds are not really an issue in my environment. I’ll see how it goes next time I turn on the blender or the vacuum. I would say the change volume or change program “ding” sound in the app was quite loud and jarring but the audiologist lowered that for me.

We have coyotes in our area and they make an interesting yipping sound at night that is audible to my husband in our house. I always wondered what they sound like and finally heard then for the first time a couple of days ago. Really neat experience!

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#7

I’ll try that if it happens again - thanks!

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#8

There used to be a way of disabling the phone ringing in your aids but I cannot find it. The ringing was a feature added after I started wearing MFi aids 10 years ago.

#9

Settings-Accessibility-Hearing Devices-Play Ringtones. Leave the slider off to not have the phone ringing in your aids.

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#10

I definitely need some more coffee this morning. I looked at least twice and missed that.

#11

Interesting. I have the same issue with my ReSound Omnias and it happens about once a day. I’m not sure whether it involves “iPhone separation,” streaming, or using my Apple watch to turn the external mics on or off or otherwise remotely control the Smart 3D app on my iPhone. I’ve associated it (perhaps wrongly) with the upgrade to iOS 16.3.1, since I didn’t notice it before that update. After uninstalling the Smart 3D app, unpairing and repairing my HA’s, and reinstalling the Smart 3D app, often just force-killing and relaunching the Smart 3D app is enough to restore connectivity to the disconnected HA (which recently has usually been the right). Otherwise, just as for you, resetting the affected HA fixes the problem. The ReSound Omnia is a MFi hearing device. Other posters in this thread assume that you are an iPhone user. Is that so?

Threads related to my Omnia connectivity problem: iOS 16.3.1 and Connectivity Issues and Resound Omnia 9 battery problem - #5 by jim_lewis. Another user has had similar problems with a number of Omnias and the ReSound One on their iPhone also (see 2nd thread).

#12

I seem to have had fewer problems since I removed the Oticon Companion app.

#13

Thanks for your observations. I’m on the verge of jumping from Oticon OPN S1 to the Real 1 series mostly because this is the last time I can force my insurer to eat some of the bill in less than 5 years before I have to enter the 5-year cycle.

#14

I have the Signia AX7 aids. PEriodically the app fails to pair with bluetooth. However, when I go to my aids through the accsibility route, they are always indeed connected. Without having to turn anything off and then on, I’m able to control the aids perfectly this way.
This morning when the aids failed to connect in the app, I turned the phone off and then back on. Issue solved.
A signia rep once had me uninstall and re-download the app. that’s worked as well. But this happens frequently enough that I just go to accessibility etc. and do that. Eventually, somehow, the app starts to connect again.

#15

For my Omnia issue, any affected aid is always disconnected in the MFi Hearing Devices or the Ear widget for Hearing Devices in the Control Center (swipe down from the top of the right side of a screen on an iPhone).

#16

Do you find the app useful? I do not tend to use any app and some people find the aids stay connected better to the phone without the app.

#17

The app is a bit quicker to get to. I use it when it’s working. However, the Iphone ‘accesibility’ feature includes Live Listen, which the app doesn’t. I haven’t done much with this last function, but it indicates that the IPhone has more options for my aids than the Signia app. Which is bizarre, if you think about it.

The Signia app has had a two star rating forever. It sucks, essentially. If it merely managed to consistently connect, I’d be happy.

#18

Having more sounds available and your brain doing the filtering keeps your brain fit and research has shown that “loss of hearing” can have have a negative effect on the brain and could have a role in developing dementia.

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#19

Thanks for this review. It’s very helpful. I’m trialing Phonak Lumity L90-RT and having a few issues so will be moving on to the Oticon Reals next.

A few quick questions:

a) Can you adjust the external volumes microphones separately when you are either on the phone or using BT to stream music, podcasts, TV, etc. The Lumitys don’t allow this external mic control except in a roundabout “mixer” type of approach which IMHO doesn’t work very well.

b) If you happen to have an iPhone, how would you rate the integration between iPhone and Reals? I realize Apple Watch support is not yet present but will hopefully be coming.

Thanks very much.

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#20

I currently have the More but am getting the Real. They are both made for iPhone so work very well. The Phonak aids just have basic Bluetooth classic pairing.