I agree with you. Yesterday I returned the aids. Audi is going to call Phonak to get training, and then she will called me back. I don´t know how long it will take that, so I already contacted to another audi. I am waiting to get an appointment. Thanks.
I am sorry for your bad experience. I thing Phonak should do much more to help and train audis. This is a big company with good hearing aids, but as per I am reading here, its customer service is very poor. My audi has told that since the beginning (but I did not pay much attention due that I know she is inclined on Resound). Cross my fingers for you with the new fitting with the Phonak audi.
Thanks Um Bongo, I guess this could give some light to audis (at least to start on right foot). But I guess it is insufficient and totally unfair for us, the customers. As per you have told here, we are buying a Ferrari, I mean a last generation high tech product, but audis are not ready to give the service. Thanks for your support to this forum. I guess you are busy, but I see you always take the time to help us here. Thanks for that again.
Hey gmlr,
I wasn’t trying to be rude to you. I don’t work for Phonak (I’m an exec at a large IT company). I’m actually quite sympathetic to your situation and I would certainly like to help you or anyone else within this discussion group. I have spent quite a bit of time posting my impressions of the Smart IXs in an effort to pass along useful information to other people who are hearing impaired
What bothered me about this discussion thread is that there are audiologists out there who are trying to fit these new and highly sophisticated hearing aids without getting the proper training prior. Phonak should not allow this to happen. It would be kinda like letting people drive cars without requiring them to take driving lessons and get a license.
These hearing aids are awesome when they are fitted properly. I think these are the best hearing aids that I have ever owned. If there is no audiologist in your area that knows how to fit these hearing aids, my suggestion is to go with another brand of hearing aid that can be properly supported in your area by a knowledgeable audiologist. The only other option is to wait a few months until the audiologists in your area have had a bit more time to learn the new technology.
Jordan.
Hi all,
I’m in agreement with JordanK on two points: first - that the Phonak Spice range is very advanced and quite good and second - that they are only as good as the audi that fits them. Too many currently haven’t been trained to do the fitting properly.
The feedback test that the Target software contains is new and different. Many audiologists don’t understand how critical it is to programming the Spice aids correctly. Not only do they need to run the test with the hearing aids in your ears, they also need to ensure that the parameters around the fitting (type of tip, etc.) have been entered correctly before the test begins. WHENEVER a change is made during a fitting that would impact the parameters, they need to be changed in the software and the feedback test needs to be run again.
From my own experience and reading many other posts, the majority of issues being experienced with these aids are the result of either no feedback test being run or the test being run improperly (including the parameters set incorrectly).
Even my own audiologist who is knowledgeable about Phonak and experienced fitting their HAs has been surprised by the power of feedback test and the important role it is playing in setting up a problem-free fitting. Its the combination of the new Target software and the way this feedback test seems to be working with the Spice HAs that is causing the confusion and complexity (combined with the lack of training so far).
When my audi has had a question, he has simply picked up the phone with me sitting with him and called Phonak. The customer service people have answered quickly and have been able to guide him to a successful outcome. I’m lucky that he is open to asking. I’m sure some audiologists don’t want to admit they don’t know something and try to bluff their way through to bad results.
Chris
I do not understand:
Some say: Let the Target Software do everything and do not change it.
and the same people say:
Audios have no training and should not do the fitting of the spice aids without training.
Training…what for ?
To let the software do the automatic fitting ?
I had the feedback test with my aids in my ears.
Before the test the aids were good. During the feedback test I noticed that the voices suddenly got higher.
At the end of the feedback test the aids were hardly hearable, even the beginning melody was very low.
That means after the feedback test with the aids in my ears we had a worse result.
In the months since October I had some programing, that was good and some that was bad. Mostly bad, only my first YES work well.
The problem is: You could not say why it was good or bad, you could not say what the aids are doing or changing.
The reason, why I will see a Phonak-direct-audio is:
My audio called phonak several times and got different answers. Contrary answers. (I myself got no answers)
Ok, I accept your apologizes. I like more this post than previous one. I would like to talk same things as to talk about your hearing aids. What you say is absolutelly truth, but I don´t know who is in “fault” if Phonak or Audis…I guess both.
I didn´t want to try another make, because I have heard very good reviews of this model from people like you that are fortunate having an expert audi on Target software.
PD: my first option was Widex Clear Passion 440 really, but it is not FDA approved yet.
Yes, it looks like there is a lot of misinformation about Spice platform and Target software. Hopefully somebody at Phonak receive some feedback from customers, so they do something fast.
gmlr, I would recommend when you look for a new audi. Find one who also fits oticon agil pro aids. that way you can compare the audeo s with the oticon agil pro. and let us know.
On another subject, it would be fascinating to know that the feed back manager is the root of all issues that people had with the audeo smart ix aid when it comes to speech in noise performance. Can somebody with ipfg test this out? create a new program and not run the feed back manager and test it in noise and then run the feed back manager and then test it again in noise to see if there’s a significant improvement.
But I find this to be a shortcoming with ipfg. Probably something that should be done automatically with the option to turn it off. Considering how dumb down it is.
I spoke to my audi today, and she was receptive to what I read to her about the feedback test, and is willing to call phonak (yet again) and do it as UnBongo suggests.
I was there when she had Phonak on the line, and the rep did NOT tell her to run the feedback manager first! My audi also told me that she has not seen a Phonak rep her in NJ in YEARS - otherwise she would have asked for personal training!
So thanks for all of your comments that I am able to give to my audi.
Hi Gmir, I would say to you be cautious about “just finding the right audi” who will make everything great. Last year I spent about 6 months trying to find the right audi to make my core Phonak Smart IXs operate properly. No one ever could, and I went to 4 different audis, 1 connected with a hospital, one recommended by Phonak! Phonak never did anything else to help me resolve my issue. I finally just abandoned them and I went to Costco and tried these Bernafon Verite 9s and from the 1st day I was 95% of the way there. They were clear, steady, very impressive. I didn’t have to spend months trying to find the right audi to make them work like they should.
I know these Spice HAs are supposed to be better than what I had, but the story I’m seeing unfold here in this Forum just has such a similar ring to what I experienced.
Thank you David.
Yes, I am realizing here how poor is Phonak customer service…
I´ll post something new here as soon as I get my first appointment with the new audi.
Thanks.
Well, I have been told by a family friend audiologist in Europe that the best options for my type of hearing loss would be. 1- Widex Clear Passion 440 (it is nos approved yet in USA). 2- Phonak Audeo S Smart IX. 3- Oticon Agil Pro
Since Clear 440 is not yet approved in USA, I am trying the second option. It is already hard to find an audi experienced on Spice platform (Target software), so I´ll forget about to find an expert on both Phonak and Oticon 
I´ll let you know more regarding my new audi, as soon as I get the very first set up.
For what its worth, my experience is that after wearing a pair of Audeo YES IXs for two years I decided to upgrade to a pair of Smart S IX’s primarily to have the peace of mind of an extra pair (I travel a lot) and found myself in a situation very similar to the original poster (gmlr) where sounds were hollow, “unbearable” loudness, feedback problems and overall a bad experience.
It was not only after my Audie scheduled a session with the Phonak rep in my area where she redid the entire setup that I got the correct programming.
It all boiled down to improper use of the feedback test as cnicklo suggests (it seems to be true that in some cases you don’t want to run it). She also used the latest 1.1 software as there seems to be a problem related to this test on the previous version.
Now with the initial default programming (no adjustments) everything is great…
Hope that helps.
What an envy!!!
Please let us know if there are any significant improvements in the aid performance.
So does anybody know exactly what the feedback test does? obviously improves feedback performance. but I can’t imagine enhancing just the feedback performance would cause an aid to sound that much better.
What I gather from my visit is that, while “WhistleBlock” will try to control feedback when it happens, the Feedback test will aim to prevent it from happening in the first place by evaluating the acoustic properties of the ear canal together with the dome/tip selected in the s/w and then limiting the output of the HA in order to prevent feedback. That is what the annoying tones are for. If the output is limited too much (across too many frequencies) this can change the way the HA sounds.
YMMV
Er. Not quite.
The check uses a control sound from the receiver to examine the properties of the canal and surrounding plumbing like you said. This is not just to eliminate feedback, it also sets the gain higher or lower based on the impedance measurement of the canal. Therefore it’s quite possible that for larger canals the target gain will be raised by the process, though it’s more likely that the new canal resonance is identified and the aid realises not to dump lots of gain in this area (about 2.6KHz ish).
HTH
Many thanks for the clarification. I wish there was a technical manual accessible for these somewhere…
Pman
I am having the same problem with reverberation - did your audi turn off or turn on the sound recovery.
Thanks