Can someone explain how using Phonak Marvel hearing aids with Zoom on a laptop would work? I’m assuming the audio would be streamed to the hearing aids. Would it use the hearing aids microphone or the laptop’s? I think I’ve read of some issues with Zoom, but don’t see a thread. Any suggestions for best experience appreciated. I’ve listened to Zoom meetings through hearing aids before but never tried to interact. Thanks.
You could just use a Phonak TV Connector. Plug it into the audio jack. But I think you would still need something to capture your audio. I believe my set up uses the webcam mic. I use Skype and Zoom frequently this way.
The other way would be bluetooth - which as you know would consume more power. I am unsure now, come to think of it - as to whether the hearing aid microphones would relay ones speech.
Yes, it can use. Just connect them to pc and select them as headphones and mic.
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Thanks. I see where I can select either the laptop microphone or the hearing aids microphone. So I assume I can use either? (unlike with a phone) What is people’s experience regarding which works best. I thought I’ve heard of people having issues with Zoom.
I haven’t got any problems
I stream Zoom and Teams meetings from my laptop to my Paradise aids frequently. It works great.
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Same here, just select it as streaming device and mic thats all.
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I have Phonak Marvels less than a year old, and a two-year-old Apple MacBook Pro laptop. I have on a few occasions been able to connect the Phonaks to the laptop via Bluetooth, but it’s far from reliable. I tried doing it again last night and could never get it to work. So I would not want to depend on going that route.
I think it would work fine once the connection is made.
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My laptop (Chromebook) connects fine with built in Bluetooth. I had connection issues with Desktop until I started using an Insignia BT Dongle from BestBuy. Trying a BT Dongle would be the first thing I’d try in troubleshooting Bluetooth. I was more concerned about Zoom. I thought I’d heard of some having issues, but perhaps not. Will find out in a couple of days.
What I do is use my cell phone to call in to zoom meetings. There is always an option to call in or use computer Audio. Once you call in you are prompted to enter the meeting ID and then your user ID. After that you join the meeting and it is just like using the computer audio and you can still use your keyboard to mute and unmute your microphone.
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Just finished meeting. Streaming to hearing aids and using hearing aid microphones worked great with my Chromebook. Very pleased.
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I have month-old KS9s (i.e., Costco-branded Marvels) and have paired to my PC with no issues (if I remember correctly, they look like headphones to Windows). When I couldn’t get satisfactory performance, replaced the BT/WiFi chip with the latest revision. Still, the audio drops out for a second or less VERY frequently, rendering it unusable (even for streaming music).
I’m surprised that people are getting good performance with a dongle – seems like an up-rev’d chip effectively be the same thing?
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I tried it on my desktop and was unable to get it to work with Zoom. I stream audio from the PC just fine. I’ll stick with my chromebook for Zoom.
When connected using bluetooth, both PC and Cell works MUCH better then without BT. Still, there are challenges. (If someone insists on Zoom, use it. But, I’ve found Google MEET to be 20 x easier to work with, vs an hour trying to get a new user set up with Zoom.)
Bluetooth issues when used on phones and PCs from Phonak’s Marvels:
- You can only register TWO BT devices. So, if you plan to use your phone, wife’s phone, auto speakerphone, tablet: You have to pick only two of these to pair. Otherwise, you must choose to “forget the HA” on one of your two devices, and then re-pair with a new/different device. VERY IRRITATING!! What moron engineer thought that storing only two BT made sense!! (Shows that in general, the engineers and marketing arms of most HA companies are totally out of touch with users, IMO.)
- Battery life is only slightly reduced, ~ 30% if constantly used. I listen to music on whatever device I’m on, most of the time. So it only lasts about 12 hours of constant music. It also depends on how loud you play it as well.
- Switching PC -> Phone -> PC, etc. ia difficult. – You will have to go to the PC/phone device, and DISABLE that BT connection, in settings. Then, on the other device, connect that BT. I keep a tab open on my PC, and only disable that BT connect, not all BT. If you force a disconnect, it will generally try to connect to the other device in a minute or so. Disconnecting on my phone, I disable BT. This is the biggest problem and inconvenience with BT, and I doubt if BT can easily be forced to switch devices from the HA.
- Walking away too far, makes it disconnect, then reconnect every 15 seconds. On my new W-10 PC, the only way I can fix it, is to force a disconnect from the PC settings, and then reconnect when I am close to the PC again. Otherwise, the connection is NEVER fixed properly. Phone doesn’t do this–For some reason is only a PC issue.
- PC’s BT connection TO different services in Windows 10 can be a guessing game – This can be a huge problem, and you have to learn how to work around many different problems as they arise. Here are the issues: The SOURCE of “sound” that “you HEAR” is set to speakers, BT, or headset, The MIKE is also set to one of these THREE. W-10 tries to outsmart you, and will auto-connect and re-configure. Worse, each browser and app does it differently, each vendor like Soundblaster does their own thing as well. Next, phone use, Skype, Meet and Zoom, ALL try to change the settings accordingly. My advice is to simply find a combination order that works, and try not to change from that. Below, I will show how I use mine on my PC. DON’T change a bunch of “Sound” and “Mike” settings, without understanding that all these things above, will thwart, whatever work you just did, and change your settings again. You can’t just set it, and expect it to stay.
- BT on W-10 sees the HA as TWO DIFFERENT TYPES of devices, “HeadSET”, and “HeadPHONES”. You would be wrong if you thought the word “HeadPHONES” means speakers AND a microphone. NOPE, if you want the MIKE, then you must use “HeadSET”. Otherwise, you will be using the laptop’s microphone and the HA’s to ONLY listen. To verify, what WINDOWS-10 sees, check your BT connection in SETTINGS, and it should say: “R-Phonak - Connected: VOICE “,” MUSIC”, which MEANS “headSET”, i.e., BOTH, with the HA’s MIKE and SPEAKER. But, when your Meet or Zoom wants you to choose or test a device, there are MORE choices, but often, not what you need. You generally won’t be able to set anything that stays set. Today, only headSET is showing, but not HaedPHONES. Sometimes you can change to choose, “default device”, which is yet another setting that can change, and is hard to control. Once to fix, I had to re-pair so Windows would set the defaults properly. Other times, a reboot fixes problems.
- Phonak Marvel’s have two modes of BT connections and one pairing, I think–sound and microphone. After pairing, it will likely show both. It is ONLY connected though, to the RIGHT HA and NOT the left. So, if you recharge the left, you can keep listening to music in the right. But, you can’t listen to BT from the left. Evidently, it gets sound for the left channel, only through it’s internal radio, Right-HA to Left-HA, and not BT.
- My goto settings are to listen to music using my browser, Vivaldi and use Chrome for Meet. Then, when using Meet, I open Chrome in addition, and then just click on my bookmarked link for Meet. As soon as meet opens, it mutes all the sound from Vivaldi, and I can talk and listen through the HA. When I close Meet or Chrome, then I can MANUALLY RE-Enable whatever I was listening to in Vivaldi
- Anther tip I learned, is to MUTE the sound on the laptop speakers BEFORE enabling the BT HA’s. Why?? Because when the music you are listening to through the HA is playing, you don’t intend to blast it through the speakers. This WILL occur when the batteries go dead on the HA, and it will switch playback to the speakers–UN-intentional sound to everyone else at night is annoying. But, since the sound volume/mute is set PER path, it will already be off when switching back to speakers as the batteries go dead.
– Don’t forget that music played through Phonak’s CAN sound great, if you use totally occluded “C-Tip” acrylic molds. Freq response can then give you good bass down to 8 HZ, vs the SPEC that they say only goes down to 100 Hz. (This limit is ONLY on ambient amplification, NOT a spec for BT!!). See other impassioned posts I’ve done on this subject. I’ve always wanted a sound system that sounded like a $6000 setup, and now I do. 
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I don’t know why people seem to have better luck with dongles. One thought is that the antenna is closer, but I doubt that’s it. A common response from hearing aid manufacturer is to use a Sennheiser dongle.
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Could this be a windows 10 problem? I’m having a awfully hard time connecting Naida M90 to Zoom or anything in Windows 10. Showing pair and when trying to connect wants to pair again. In device manager showing bt hearing aids as installed. Have a HP Paviliion laptop. I got a bt microsoft mouse the other day may disconnect that and see what happens.
I clearly don’t know. I do know that with my Dell desktop I had no problems pairing but could not connect. I bought a cheap BT dongle and the hearing aids paired and connected without issue. However, Zoom is an issue on the Desktop. There’s an earlier post on this thread that lays out all of the moving parts involved.
I tried the bt doogle and it connected to Zoom but had trouble with the speakers cutting out. My ha connect to my phone and an eight year old sony blue ray player with bluetooth and no issues. Disconnecting the the bt mouse did not do anything. Tried to remove the ha and mouse from the bt got an error message removed failed. a dead end here. I’m on Zoom about four days a week. The speakers on the HP pavilion are B&O which are pretty nice I don’t know if they might be causing issues or not. Even with my profound hearing loss for the most part I can hear what is being said hard to follow sometimes. This HP laptop has the latest Intel wireless blue tooth. If I use the bt doogle I have to disable the Intel bluetooth. I don’t know about firmware updates.
Hello Everybody,
I have currently been wearing the Phonak Marvels for a few years and using BT streaming for work videos on Zoom and MS Teams. I have never had any issues once the setup on Windows 10 is configured.
I am currently using a third party BT usb dongle and it works great. This one is a BT 5 version which I have.
Cheers
Gary.
I’d read carefully through this: Profile - DaaBoss - Hearing Aid Forum - Active Hearing Loss Community