Phonak Marvel - vibrating tremolo effect for high pitched (electronic) sounds

Hearing Aids
17

Regarding the Phonak Marvels and the ‘trill’ or ‘tremolo’ effect, here is my attempt to capture the problem.
There are links to nine audio clips. All were recorded using a Neumann TLM-184 microphone through a Focusrite Scarlett USB Audio Interface, into my Macintosh running Logic X Pro Audio recording software.

There are two basic things here:

First are single notes, particularly a C sharp, recorded through the aids with the mic as isolated as possible from the room, so you are only getting the sound of the aids. I did this with the AUTOSENSE 3.0 program and the MUSIC program that’s manually in my aids (without Whistle Stop, using the OMNI mic). Then I recorded single notes in the room as captured by the mic without the aids.
I have samples here of just the aids, the aids mixed with the room (to illustrate the sound one would have wearing aids in real life), and then just the room.

There’s also one single note melody with just the sound of the aids set to AUTOSENSE to give an idea of musical context.

1: Single notes recorded by the microphone in the room, no hearing aids:

  1. Single notes recorded by the microphone through aids MUSIC program with room mixed in:

  1. Single notes recorded by the microphone through aids MUSIC program without the room mixed in:

  1. Single notes recorded by the microphone through aids AUTOSENSE 3.0 program with the room mixed in:

  1. Single notes recorded by the microphone through aids AUTOSENSE 3.0 program without the room mixed in:

  1. A single note and two-notes at once melody recorded by the microphone through aids AUTOSENSE 3.0 program without the room mixed in:

Then I basically did the same thing with a chord melody - Just the AUTOSENSE with the aids, just the MUSIC program with the aids, and then just the room through the Neumann Mic.

  1. Chord Melody and single notes recorded by the microphone in the room, no aids:

  1. Chord Melody and single notes recorded by the microphone through aids MUSIC program without the room mixed in:

  1. Chord Melody and single notes recorded by the microphone through aids AUTOSENSE 3.0 program without the room mixed in:

For me, the single notes show the trill/tremolo effect in the most obvious manner.

For the chord melodies, it presents more as distortion than ‘trill’.

All input levels were kept below 0dB so there was no distortion coming in or going out.

For the guitar people, it’s an electric guitar built by Joe Yanuziello straight into a Quilter MicroPro Mach 2 8" amp.

As far as real-world issues, voices that get slightly higher pitched and louder produce the same trilling, as do beeps and such from computers, appliances, etc.

Anyway, I hope this helps illustrate and define the issue.

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