This business of making batteries non-replaceable was started by Apple with their phones. Samsung adopted that policy a couple years later. I think the idea w. phones is to get users to buy the “new” model. I guess w. these HA it’s to collect $350 every year or so.
I’m new to the forum and was intrigued by the Rechargeable Discussion. I even went to HearingTracker.com to look at their survey results. The little I know about batteries is that they all are not the same. A 312 seems to have capacities ranging between 150-180mAh and 13 seems to range between 270-300mAh. Yet, from what I read, the actual functional capacity seems to be around 70% of that value with zinc-air. Once the tab is removed to activate the air holes, the battery starts to drain and never stops. I also wondered about all the differences reported on the surveys between everyone’s reported battery-life. I imagine it’s like gas in a car. Some may get 20mpg and others 25—based on how you drive or other factors (at least that’s what my wife tells me!). It must be the same with hearing aids. How much streaming? Type of streaming? Features activated like feedback and noise management. I guess we all have different listening habits.
So, some of us may get 3 days on a battery and others 1 week. That could be $1 per week per hearing aid plus the inconvenience of never knowing when my battery is going to stop working—usually in a movie or in church. That’s one of the reasons why I’m so intrigued by the new rechargeable products coming from Phonak, Signia, and ZPower. From what I’ve read on this forum and heard from my audiologist, two (Phonak, Signia) will use lithium-ion batteries. These need to be sealed in the hearing aids because of the dangers and flammability associated with this type of battery. That must mean it’s like the cell-phone and they only can be removed at the factory.
I’d hate to have my dog chew one of these hearing aids, like has happened in the past. I suspect that would be the end of the dog! Also, when the battery stops charging in 1-2 years, I then would have to send the hearing aid back to the manufacturer for replacement. Hopefully, I can get a loaner or is this going to be an excuse to try and sell me a new one? Also, if the battery dies during the day because I was doing a lot of streaming, I’d have to take the hearing aid off for an hour or so to quick charge. I can’t imagine taking off the hearing aids during the day—going without hearing for an hour–so that I can charge them.
At least the ZPower System provides the option of using a zinc-air battery if I’m traveling, forget to charge, or streaming for 7 hours during the day. Both the silver-zinc and lithium-ion batteries seem to have enough capacity to work all day (16-17 hours), even with streaming (3 hours). Plus, the reported capacity of the ZPower silver-zinc battery seems to be higher than the reported capacity of the same size lithium-ion batteries. I guess if silver-zinc is good enough for NASA, it’s good enough for my hearing aids. They seem to be safe and maybe won’t kill the dog!
Finally, my greatest concern is that in order to get the Phonak rechargeables, my hearing loss and hearing needs would have to match the only hearing aids that are rechargeable. It seems that only one model will offer the rechargeable battery. I’d like to think that, for the money, I’d get a choice of technology rather than a choice of batteries. At least with ZPower, I can choose among different hearing aids and then retrofit with their rechargeable battery system.
Just my 2 cents.
These need to be sealed in the hearing aids because of the dangers and flammability associated with this type of battery. That must mean it’s like the cell-phone and they only can be removed at the factory.
The vast majority of cell phones have replaceable batteries. Apple, which started the trend towards non-replaceable batteries claims they did it for design reasons, not “safety”. Samsung emulated them on a couple of their high-end models a couple years later. Cell phone manufacturers do this to “encourage” users to buy new phones every couple of years. If there were a real safety problem, everyone would do this. I guess is that most HA users only need to replace their equipment every five or six years. This would be a way for the HA manufacturers to extract money every 24 months from their customers.
And, if there really were a safety problem, the government would mandate warning labels on every single cell phone and you wouldn’t be able to carry them onto one airplane. It is true, that I don’t think you are allowed to check a carton full of batteries. And what would make the same battery that is soldered into a device any safer than one that is removable?
Haha – good question! Although some devices, like the Macbook Air, at least, use batteries that don’t have external metal cases, to keep down weight and size. So they’re kind of squishy, soldered and glued in place, and really wouldn’t be easy or safe to change out.
Sounds like a zpower advertisement from a first time poster… for an absolute fact the Signia does NOT need to be sent to the factory for a battery replacement full charge will provide a minimum of 24 hours with fulltime streaming.