I wear Phonak’s P90 HAs and went in for an adjustment two weeks ago two years after my last one. I wear Activevent receivers and have quite severe hearing loss. The latest adjustment hasn’t been very smooth with a whole of issues including bluetooth quality, overall sound quality, loudness etc. I’ve now had to see the audiologist four times during these past two weeks.
After my fourth adjustment yesterday I felt the sound quality etc was fine. I later discovered that whenever I watched videos or heard music the volume would fluctuate and the sound quality was poor. I tested the bluetooth connection on my Android phone, Iphone and Macbook Air.
I am using Phonak’s updated App but as everyone is aware you can’t adjust the Bluetooth+Mic settings.
Has anyone experienced the same kind of BT issues and you were able to resolve them? If so, what was the solution?
Here are a couple of thoughts. You mentioned that your hearing loss is severe. The Activevent receivers are M (medium) receivers may no longer be suitable for your losse. I had Activevent receivers with my L90 aids but found that the headroom of my Activevent receivers was disappearing as my hearing worsened. I am not sure what you mean by by poor sound quality when using Bluetooth, but I found that the lack of headroom in my receivers became much more apparent when streaming than it was when I was just listening through the hearing aid microphones. Clipping was more obvious to me when streaming. I was disappointed when I needed to give up the Activevent receivers and go to P receivers. You might discuss this with your audi when you see them again especially if your audiogram is not current.
Hi, I have 2P receivers for my P70T’s, I have never had the ones you have, and as far as I’m concerned the P types are great, sound is quality is excellent for all modes, so I also agree with raylock1, you may have to go that route, look at my Audiogram, it’s way down there, but these receivers make it seem like all’s good. I thank my Audi fro her great work.
Thanks for your thoughts. It’s interesting what you said about the headroom of your ActiveVent receivers disappearing as your hearing got worse. A few points in response:
During a visit to the US in the summer of 2021 I decided to see an ENT specialist and an Audi as I felt my hearing had deteriorated considerably. The Audi recommended I get HAs for my left ear and a cochlear implant for my right ear, in which I also experience tinnitus.
I read about Oticon and Phonak as being among two of the leading HAs at that time and decided to go with the P90s (P receivers) as I was able to test them out from an Audi and was happy with them. I did not have the time to test out any other HAs as I had to head back home to Bangladesh.
While I found P90 was a great improvement over my previous Unitron HAs and I read about the ActiveVent receivers and decided to get them. I found them to be quite a godsend - sound clarity and volume seemed much better compared to my P receivers.
My central hearing problem is understanding speech and which is a near-impossibility in any noisy environment such as parties, restaurants, etc.
Thus far my HAs served me well until I decided to visit a local Phonak Audi to tweak my HAs as I hadn’t had them adjusted or my hearing tested since 2023.
This led the Audi to adjust my HAs taking into account my ActiveVent receivers and totally 4 adjustments in just two weeks.
I am still not completely satisfied after my latest adjustments and have used MyPhonak app to create a customized programme to deal with the right HA feeling a tad bit too loud with a slightly clogged feeling.
As I mentioned earlier, a major problem I’m facing is on my Macbook the bluetooth volume drops quite low after about five seconds of watching any video or listening to any music, along with distortion and crackling type sounds. The volume then automatically increases some seconds later.
Attached is my latest Audiogram along with the latest Target software changes from yesterday.
Would very much appreciate if anyone can decipher what tweaks may result in fixing my bluetooth issue and improving my overall settings. I also wonder if I ought to get a new pair of Activevent receivers or return to P receivers.
OK, I am only a user here and hopefully one of the professionals @Um_bongo or @Neville will share a comment. But, unless your hearing has worsened dramatically in the lows, I don’t understand why the Activevents are/were of any benefit to you. I would think you need P receivers as the headroom with M receivers is pretty small.
Changes in volume may be AutoSense trying to select the correct environment. That happens to me also, not so much with my Infinios. I create (or have the audi create, using Target) separate manual programs which I can select. Sorry I am not more help. Hopefully you will get some better answers.
Yeah, your first clinician should have counseled you away from the activent unless your hearing had changed dramatically since then.
Did your new clinician do real ear verification? Is there a reason the gain is turned way down under targets? Hard to know exactly what the problem is with just that screenshot.
I have never had an audiologist nail anything, but basic settings. It’s an inherent flaw in working with someone else on your HAs when they are capable of doing more than hearing the outside world. Your perception of sound versus their ability to understand always create frustration. That forced me at hand to get the Phonak Target software, learn it, and make my own adjustments.
If you are at all technical, and willing to spend a few hundred extra to buy the equipment second hand, I’d look into it. There’s plenty of support in this community to get you where you want to be.
I had issues with the revised app, with the aids Auto switching randomly, even though I don’t have Autosense as startup. I deleted the 3 app created programmes, and it stopped.
Although you can’t adjust streaming through the app, it does have 2 separate fittings, as in Speech and Music. They both have separate gains, MPOs and programme options. I suspect your aids are switching between the two. I set both as close to each other as I can.
You appear to have SoundRecover2 enabled. Is that really needed for your loss?
Sadly I have had to see different Audis as I live in Bangladesh. The last decent Audi I saw was in Singapore in 2023 who didn’t mention anything about not using ActiveVent. Can’t recall if real ear verification was ever done - probably not.
Will ask my Audi to check why the gain is turned down. Thanks!
As far as I’ve heard and read BT is the issue, not Phonak. Apple Airpod Max works seamlessly with Apple devices and BT. So it can be done, Phonak would have to figure out how. Right now I have several issues with their app, BT and connection/streaming. But the HAs themselves are the best for my hearing, which is my object and goal.
Thank you for your comment about BT possibly being the issue. I have MFi (supposedly) ReSound Prezas which “fade out and turn off” unexpectedly, during about a 5 second time interval. They recover normal function, also during about a 5 second interval, when ambient sound power levels exceed about 70 dB A. Very frustrating!
It seems to have happened after iOS 17 or iOS 18 updates(?).
Thanks again.
Best, Bob.
Thank you for your comment.
For clarification, I think that the devices at this link are what you have mentioned:
Apple uses a capital “P” and the plural form, with “pod” appended by and ending with “s”.
I noticed just now that Amazon has a product listed with the spelling which you have used in your post here - perhaps it’s actually a different (non-Apple?) product?
The genuine Apple version incorporates several unique features, including inward facing microphones, external over-the-ear sealing, in-device gyroscopes and accelerometers, and many sound processing characteristics for use across various Apple devices such as Macs, iPads, and iPhones. This certainly must include many automatic communication switching controls and functions, many of which are not available in (non-MFi?) hearing aids, AFAIK. The relationship of “Auracast” to the related BT codecs and functionality are not now known to me in detail; being developmental, they are of course also presently only superficially documented.
Thanks again for the opportunity for me to learn more about this technology today!
Best, Bob.
Excellent clarification. From what I understand Apple includes an H1 (or H2) chip that allows phenomenal seamless reconnection with their devices. Regardless of what I think of the sound quality of the headphones themselves, Apple has the BT connection issue licked. Also as far as I can tell, no one comes close–maybe the Bose Quiet Comfort Ultra. There is also the BT codecs AAC, SBC, aptX, aptX HD, aptX LL, aptX adaptive, and LDAC within the BT system. Who knows which one Phonak uses (let me guess AAC)–But this is for another forum. If Phonak could adopt some BT protocol similar to Apple (which uses the lowest grade bitrate AAC), we wouldn’t be having this discussion. It is a problem for me every day, between the streaming phone calls and car connection. It’s a mess but I prefer having the problem than no connection at all.
Thanks.
The identification and connection protocols must include timing logic, proximity detection, S:N level validation, and other authentication secret sauce, possibly including phase locked loops and other wireless (radio) communications. Apple also uses their own servers for some encryption and privacy features, including dedicated Apple iCloud accounts for their users. This practice makes possible certain other capabilities, many of which “just work”. Apple CarPlay is another dimension.
As another example, I am using Apple Home, with two Logitech cameras outside of our “smart home”. I was surprised yesterday when, with my iPhone in our home about 100 feet away, I nevertheless received an automatic audio notification, streamed to my ReSound Preza HA’s, that a camera had detected a person (it was me, later properly also identified and also announced as such - also via HA streaming notification!) when I walked up my driveway and out to the street to retrieve my USPS mail.
Persons, packages, animals, and vehicles all can be distinguished and identified through Apple Photo logic implementation in iCloud, in near real time, by analyzing the Logitech camera’s images!
There’s lots going on with Apple - for example, each of their AirPods Max has six outward facing and two inward facing mics, for a total of 16 mics and copious associated acoustic signal direction and timing processing. It’s much more than “AI” marketease, apparently, and it also requires substantial signal processing power, of course.
Thanks again. Best, Bob.
Hey Bob – love it! It goes further though with BT codecs and protocols for our “benefit.” There a several cometing ANC (Adaptive Noise Control) headsets that are so similar it;s a joke. they all have those multiple microphones in and out and while Apple may be proprietary and very good, Bose is considered the best(!) But, now to our HAs. I wonder how much of that is a foundry in China with separate entrances and exits. I’ve demo’d (at home) 5 different iterations of AI aids in the past 6 months and settled for the Phonak I90. Only because I read it has the most advanced AI. Although the Starkey’s really didn’t work well for me. I have moderate hearing loss but can’t hear speech well in noise without the HAs. What I’m getting at, despite my great appreciation and understanding of your deeper articulation of the electronics, due to marketing and half-assed reviews and branding, I’m afraid we’re all being sold out of the same barrel. So what really intrigues me is who and when is the next biggest new development in this tech that will make us very excited and actually work? Not to mention at a price that isn’t based on R&D cost of $.05 and sold for $thousands. What say You?
FWIW, by some reports the Apple AirPods Pro 2 are actually better for speech in noise than most, and perhaps all (other) currently available hearing aids. If you haven’t tried them already, maybe they could work well for you? $249 per pair retail, but I bought mine from BestBuy on an open box sale, for much less.
Because my hearing impairment is substantial (note my Audiogram), they aren’t (yet) a good solution for me.
Battery life can still be a limitation for continuous use. My solution to this, so far, is to simply use replaceable size 13 zinc air batteries for my Prezas - with all-day usage and significant amounts of streaming, I find that they typically last more than one week and they are still very cheap (although now somewhat inconvenient because of “child proof” packaging mandates!) at Costco.
Nice to meet you via Hearing Tracker’s forum, and kind regards.
Thanks again.
Best, Bob.
Hey Bob—really appreciate your follow-up. This one hit closer to home. You’re right, AirPods Pro 2 get talked about a lot in HA circles now, especially since Apple started leaning into Conversation Boost and head-tracking for spatial filtering. I’ve seen some studies showing they can beat entry-level or even mid-tier HAs in speech-in-noise tests under ideal conditions. But as you noted, it’s a mileage-may-vary thing depending on your actual loss.
In my case, I’ve got moderate loss with a pretty steep dip in the highs, so I’m not sure the AirPods Pro 2 would give me enough tailored help to handle speech in a crowd. That said, I’m always curious when consumer tech gets close to what used to be reserved for medical gear—especially when it’s priced like a gadget, not a down payment on a car.
I’m using Phonak I90s now—mostly because after trying a few brands, they handled streaming and speech best for my ears. But if Apple keeps iterating, I wouldn’t be surprised if they start encroaching on HA turf even more aggressively, especially once they get FDA Class II certification dialed in.
Curious—have you ever run a side-by-side comparison between your ReSounds and the AirPods in a truly noisy setting? I’d love to know how they stack up beyond just anecdotal use.
Anyway, great to meet someone else here with real perspective and firsthand tech insight. Thanks again.
Apple CarPlay is another dimension.