Sounds like it’s time for DIY, you’ll do much better yourself, it’s pretty easy to do and plenty of people from right here on hearingtracker to help, very easy to get the software and hardware needed (as you’ve already asked, you know what to get,it’s pretty cheap on eBay, plus you’ll save a lot of frustration) Don’t worry to much about REM for now, it’s not unfortunately the holy grail for a lot of people.
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REM based live speech mapping used for fitting has nothing similar. Because this method sends speech through the speaker in front of you, and measuring tube checks what came near your eardrum (4mm away) afer your HAs processed the sound.
First step of that process is indeed white noise sound made for pure calibration of instruments and your canal.
In situ audiogram is just that, audiogram. Beeps.
Yes, it does implicitly take into the account your ear canal, but how well you hear beeps unfortunately isn’t the same as how well HA process speech and if thing that comes to your drum is even comprehensible for the machine, let alone your brain.
Yes, your fitter has no clue what’s the purpose of it. And is seller.
You can be without equipment and still know what you’re talking about or what the equipment is really used for.
Also, WRS measuring doesn’t ask for REM equipment, just a speaker and sw with prerecorded words. And if fitted aids on 65db sound from speaker cannot deliver wrs that was measured with headphones (to see what db you need to get the best score, so, amount of amplification), then they’re not fitted properly.
Word lists are especially made to cover all types of vocals and hearing issues, so from listening 20 words, and repeating them back, it’s easy to both asses the progress and see where aids need tweaking eg which sounds you don’t hear but you should since you heard them during initial wrs with headphones and those words on blastingly loud.
Rem based live speech mapping makes process easier and faster for them. Gives good baseline and comprehension for you in just a few minutes of doing it.
So basically, it’s beneficial for fitter since it saves time enormously. One fitting session of 10-15 minutes and you immediately have the best speech comprehension in quiet.
However, it isn’t necessary. Unfortunately, people who don’t do that, also don’t do anything else. So ‘do you do REM’ is simple question to filter out good fiter.
However wrs with headphones to see how much help you actually can get from ampflication and then tweaking aids until you can get at least the same wrs using them on normal loud sounds (65db), is a bare minimum!!
In situ audiogram has nothing to do with how well you understand speech with aids.
Aids are just amplifiers. So if your initial wrs test showed that you need 100db input and you understand 80% of words, then well fitted aids should give you 80% of the same words on all sounds.
So, if I speak to you on 65db, aids should boost that to give 100db your ear need.
But if you heard wood correctly but not house during initial wrs, and with aids you don’t hear any, aids aren’t fitted properly, no matter the fitting process (rem is that, fitting process). However, no aid in the world will give you back house if your cochlea is that damaged and just cannot hear those sounds.
In other words, if your initial wrs is 90 or more, that means that aids can help you to understand almost everything.
If wrs is 50, aids won’t bring you up to 90, however, without them, you cannot hear even that 50, so they’re still useful to deliver that 50.
You only care about end results after all.
How can they know if you hear well if they don’t test and verify what they’re done?
‘how do you hear me now’ aren’t words from word list that addresses tricky sounds
Tell them you won’t need their services obviously, so, ask for unbundled price, just aid, without endless hours of pathetic work based on ‘how do you hear me now’. You can do better yourself, if nothing then from the sheer fact that you can directly test and tweak in your environment eg home, and not perfectly quiet office.
And from the fact that phonak programming software has a wizard which helps with fitting.
Like ‘problem with own voice’, then you click, and it adjust gains. Or ‘problem with female voices’. Or ‘problem with s, sh sound’ or many others.
You don’t need to be an expert to read that and click around.
It’s literally made in ‘for dummies’ approach.
Good fitter doesn’t use that since they now how sound behaves and they directly adjust gains when you tell them and describe your issue.
But sw is so good that you can pick an issue and it will do gain adjustment per frequency for you.
And I think we all are ‘smart’ enough to not click ‘problem with own voice’ if we have problems with sh sound.
And you can record your list, and put it on repeat and check which words you hear completely and which don’t.
It’s not even about perfect recording or calibration, it’s about being able to repeat the process in the same conditions and being able to compare before and after tweak.
And yes, sw has ‘undo’ and even direct comparison between two points in time/sessions.
It’s just that ‘how do you hear me now’ aren’t useful words for testing. Especially since you probably look at person.
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So I have been silent for a while while I have been getting the bits and pieces together and doing more research. I now have the Noahlink wireless connected to my MacBook Pro running Windows on Parallels Desktop. All now working.
My Audiologist did come to my house with a Phonak Audiologist bringing their equipment and did some changes. The major difference being changing the fitting Formula to NAL-NL 2 and the improvement was very significant. That being said I still want to try some minor tweaks.
Although I have done a bunch or reading and going through the manual and videos I just want to check with folks on some simple basics. I have connected my Aids to the Target 7.1 software and saved the session to my notebook without making any changes. If I screw up when playing around - what is the easiest way to “reload” the saved settings as they are now. Simply put if I make changes how best to undo to what I have right now?
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Hi @nick.evered
Reload an old setting is easy to do:
Before you start your session, select in Target the original customer/session you want to reload.
Select “connect”. After the connection is established, Target compares selected session’s data and the hearing aid data. If they are different, Target will ask you whether to use the sessions data or the hearing aids settings.
Select this time the sessions data.
Then leave the session.
You will be asked, where the data shall be saved: hearing aids and / or to the session. Select only the hearing aids, so your (prevously) saved session will be untouched.
To play around, choose another session to start your own setting. Best is to define even a new customer name for your own sessions. To keep your originals save. For example name it “nick selffitting”.
This time you can save in both, the hearing aids and the session data.
And with on the fly testing: Each step can be undone with ctrl-z.
Yeah and one more thing:
- never leave the room while connected
- do not change your settings while not connected
The HA may be blocked.
See here how to solve it: Phonak Paradise P90-R can't be switched on / crackle in left HA
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Hi All, so I have been playing around a bit wrapping my head around various options and each of the different programs. Thank you all so much with assistance on being able to keep original settings and reload when I screw up bit time - but mistakes seems to always be the best learnings! 
So right now I am pursuit of good music streaming while I am cycling - Two pieces I would like advice on. 1) Trying to improve bass response so the music doesn’t sound too tinny - I know I cant expect Dr Beats quality but any kind of improvement would be good. 2). Wind Noise. It seems a big trade-off here. My first attempt played music well but the faster I peddled the quieter the hearing aids adjusted.
Any hints or experiences with Music adjustment well appreciated.
Hi Nick
I’m glad you get familiar with the programming. And yeah,it’s quite a learning procedure!
To improve the bass, you might try to use larger occluded domes. I changed to power domes instead of the custom made shells and got quite a good low frequency respond now.
I have the same issue with cycling. When I’m not streaming, I use a manual program with wind block set to the max. But it’s not satisfying…
For streaming, I set the mics to OFF, to have no environmental noise. There is a check box in the streaming options to do so. I know, it’s a bit dangerous when cycling, but I do it anyway only when I’m alone with low traffic…
Thanks for getting back to me - doesn’t switching of the mics in music also impact when you want to speak on the phone??
I don’t think so, music streaming and phone calls are two different Bluetooth profiles, but I’m pretty sure in target you get 2 different programs to adjust, one for Bluetooth for calls and one for Bluetooth music streaming, you can adjust the mic mix, say - 10dB would be safer when out riding your bike then turning them off completely.
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You definitly still can take your phone call, it uses the HA mics therefore.
It’s best to find out yourself what setting you prefer for the streaming.
Ok, so two questions;
- What does Program Transition Speed actually do? I have fiddled with it but it doesn’t seem to make much difference.
- I have been playing with WhistleBlock, NoiseBlock, SoundRelax and I like some of the effects. But what is the downside of using these? Using say WhistleBlock on High does that mean I am missing out on something?
Thanks in advance.
- Transition Speed: This is the speed in autosense to switch between different programs. F.e. from Calm Situation -> Speech in loud noise. Slow is more smooth and less recognizable.
- I’m asking that myself, but it sure depends on the option. I think there is a downside with Wistleblock, since reducing feedback comes usually with a gain reduction in certain frequencies.
Ok so I am getting better at this I think. Starting to get a much better experience. However one piece that I find painful in the streaming is that some apps on my iPhone trigger my Aids to go to the streaming program and others don’t. So for example whenever I go to Pinterest my aids go into streaming mode even though I have sound turned off fir Pinterest. So I can be talking to my wife hearing her through quite in calm but when I try to show her something in Pinterest my aids turn to streaming mode and I struggle with continuing the conversation.
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I also have this problem with my Android device. Whenever any sound is emitted, the hearing aid switches to the streaming program.
I think this cannot be prevented. The HA cannot distinguish between desired sound and unwanted sound.
If at all, the problem can only be solved in the individual settings for the programs in the phone itself.
The only exception is the TV adaptor. To avoid that streaming is activated in the HA just because you step back into the area where a signal is received, there is an option: The HA then emits a sound, you then have 15s time to activate streaming with a double-tab.
I thought about your question regarding the downside that can arise from the different options. I think we can assume that there is always a downside, otherwise the manufacturer would activate it fully from the beginning. I first try to understand from the technical side what the option does. Then I adjust only one option at a time. At the beginning all the way to the maximum. Sometimes I also do a separate manual program. Then I can compare the general influence by switching between the programs. When I think I have understood it more or less, I set the option to the absolute necessary. As little change as possible to keep the disadvantages as small as possible. Less is probably always better.
Hi Nick –
To help the bass response in streaming go into the streaming section of the Fit fine tuning… select all streaming (both voice and music) and select the low freq region below 1000Hz and lower and increase the low freq levels upward by 10dB or so (or higher even maybe)-- if the level starts to hit the MPO line you can push up the MPO line a bit as well if your receivers will allow it… Definitely use at least M size receivers, not S size. // if you get the level too high in the low bass region you may star to hear a vibration in strong bass music or voice – simply go back in an decrease the levels at the lowest end of the range just a bit to fix that…
I have my bass streaming sounding pretty good – not as good as a nice bose earplug, but plenty usable!
I haven’t messed w/ any wind-noise settings – haven’t had that issue. // but you might be able to play with the wind noise suppression settings as well and help that… (not sure how those actually work or how they’d change the sound) — as also mentioned you could change the external ambient sound level down during streaming all the way to zero gain if you wish to alleviate wind noise.
Whistle block apparently works by freq shifting the sound in the region near the feedback limits (or somewhere in the freq band - not sure how it chooses that) – I read somewhere that it shifts the freq by something like 10Hz or so to prevent the incoming and outgoing tones being at the same freq (a neat trick, but causing some intermixing possibly at high settings) – and with Music settings it’s typically off because of this (apparently creates some odd sounds to purists listening to music when turned way up)
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NoiseBlock seems to affect non-vocal continuous sort of sounds – if turned up the HAs will tend to suppress rumbles and other low and mid freq non-vocal noise – you can hear it when it engages … turn it way up then go into a noisy env…
SoundRelax seems to affect impulse type noise – it attenuates the initial attack edges of sounds it seems… (or something similar) softening loud low and mid freq impulse noises… interesting to play with that one too …
both of these can result in some odd undesirable effects IMO - so I leave em at the default settings for the most part… I think I do crank up the NoiseBlock in SpeechInCar mode for mine…
SoftNoiseReduction is one I like – especially if you’re in a quiet area and you hear any slight hiss from the HAs – just a slight tweak of that kills the hiss… I put that one on a ‘2’ for all but the loud noise setting…
regarding transitions to streaming – make sure the ‘Hearing aid Microphone’ settings aren’t turned down too much – I use about -6dB, and that works well for me, but bringing it up to -3dB should allow you hear people even when streaming just fine – the HAs superimpose normal external sound operation (with the attenuation you set - and with the normal HA modes active) right on top of streaming sound operation and you can hear external sounds just as well as when not streaming… (pretty much anyway) – But of course if you don’t attenuate the HA mics then you do then hear those external sounds normally when streaming too! …that’s the tradeoff… play with it…
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So I have a pretty good outcome now with music when on my bike. Although I did have to mute the mics. I know not perfect but luckily I am on bike paths all the time so no traffic other than cars. However I have a small annoyance in that Bluetooth seems to drop out every now and again - just for a second. It doesn’t happen when stationary only when peddling. I thought it might be something to do with notifications on my phone but even with DND and most turned off it still happens. Not like it can be distance as the phone is only 50cm from my Aids. Anyone else get this problem.