If running in Airplane Mode did make a big difference, why wouldn’t ReSound want to advertise it? They advertise that you get a longer battery life when you don’t stream. The HA’s, AFAIK, function perfectly well without a BT connection to my iPhone (I’ve lost the connection occasionally and haven’t noticed until I checked the Smart 3D app). I’m sure one will save some battery life, but the math on the 37.5 hr runtime in flight mode you calculate is not a “50%” increase. 7.5 hr increase / 30 hr runtime without streaming is a 25% increase in runtime over that advertised by ReSound. And if your 7.5 extra hrs were correct, 7.5 / 37.5 = 20% of available runtime, i.e., if turning on Flight Mode does completely shut off BT, then BT is only consuming 20% of the battery charge during normal operation with some level of sound input taken for granted by ISO standards.
Because the aids stop communicating with each other and their speech intelligence is reduced. Their programming is based upon the aids communicating with each other, sharing information.
Then what would be the point of entering flight mode relative to your HA’s except if it helped keep the batteries from going dead - but as long as you’re in flight mode (according to your thesis), the function of the HA’s would be seriously degraded. Entering Flight Mode would help comply with former FAA regs for NO wireless devices, but I think they’ve relaxed the rules for weak devices like HA’s, which can be kept on now, IIRC.
Starkey’s current advice:
- Don’t turn off your hearing aids or their wireless features on a plane. The FAA exempts devices like hearing aids and pacemakers because they don’t emit signals that might interfere with aircraft controls.
Source: Five do’s and five don’ts of traveling with hearing loss (starkey.com)
I think the bottom line is there is very little reason to use Flight Mode these days. It’s not even enabled by default in ReSound Fitting software (how about Oticon & Phonak?), it’s not required by the FAA, it doesn’t save much battery life at all compared to the long runtime of ReSound rechargeable or battery-powered HA’s, and according to @prodigyplace, it greatly interferes with normal hearing aid function.
Another weird thing about Flight Mode for my ReSound Omnia 962s is that I see no sign that it’s working. I enable it in Smart Fit (exit the program, reconnect, and confirm it shows Enabled checked for both HA’s). I leave my right HA off for simplicity. I open and close the battery door on my booted left HA 3x within 10 seconds. The left HA still shows up in the Smart 3D app on my iPhone as connected, it can still have its external mics turned on or off by the 3D app, have the mic volume changed, or the program changed, stream a podcast, and the left HA shows up in the Find My Hearing aid interface of the Smart 3D app, whereas the turned-off right HA was last seen minutes ago. The left HA shows up in an iPhone BT scanner app, too. It doesn’t matter if I fully open the battery door or only open it to the partially-open catch (where it’s normally turned off anyway).
It would be interesting to hear from other folks if the rechargeable Omnias or any other HA brands show up at all in a BT scanner when put in Flight Mode. Perhaps no one at ReSound bothered checking whether Flight Mode actually works for certain ReSound Omnias like the 962s because no one uses it anymore or has noticed that it’s gone south and reported it as a bug to ReSound? Or maybe my particular Omnias are both defective in entering flight mode?
One sophisticated possibility would be that my Omnia 962 only enters flight mode when the iPhone BT is also turned off but ReSound makes no mention of having to do anything about one’s smartphone in disabling wireless function for an Omnia. It just doesn’t seem to work for me. 
I d spect that flight mode stops the Omnias transmitting, but doesn’t try to stop anything sending stuff to it.
Also don’t forget that apart from streaming, the Omnias use BT to have one aid send stuff to the other. That’s how all the focusing works. So turning BT off will substantially impact the overall performance of a pair of aids.
To permit you to legally use your hearing aids on flights that have restrictions of RF emitting device use. It is likely also a legal requirement to have them approved for sale in some countries.
That would only apply for the US. Manufacturers make products to be sold worldwide if possible. Gone are the days where they make variants for different countries.
The fact that my left Omnia in “Flight Mode” is detected by the Find My Hearing Aids” in the 3D app as last seen “just now” but the turned off right one was last seen three minutes ago indicates to me that the left HA is broadcasting and probably not in true flight mode. The signal strength meter shows a fluctuating bar for the left HA but not for the right HA, too. It’s also detected by a BT scanner app on my iPhone when in “flight mode.”
The left HA when supposedly in flight mode can also change the volume of both HA’s or the program that both HA’s are in. So, it’s transmitting to the right HA, which isn’t in flight mode. Happens even when BT on iPhone is turned off. Would be great if an HA actually sent a msg to the 3D app to confirm it was truly entering flight mode to confirm the achievement of that state for sure.
An indication that something is amiss in entering flight mode is I should hear a repeated double tone after opening and closing the battery doors 3x within 10 seconds. I only hear the normal booting single dings.
Way too much over thinking on this… if you pretty much have a standard day every day. Rarely travel or pull over nighters or have physical problems with your dexterity than rechargeable are for you. If your travel for business may occasionally spend nights away or on the road or just dont want extra stuff a pack of batteries is the way to go.
I agree but would add if you do a lot of streaming and am concerned about rechargeable runtime per charge. That was one reason I avoided Phonak.
From support.apple.com:
- Turning on Airplane Mode, turns off all radios except for Bluetooth. If you turn off Bluetooth while you’re in Airplane Mode, your device will remember that and will turn off Bluetooth the next time that you turn on AirPlane Mode.
That is what Apple devices do but they don’t make hearing aids.
Ah, thank you. I figured that Jim meant he put the Phone in Airplane mode. I don’t see where my Omnia’s have a flight mode. Not important, I have only flown once since COVID and that was private.
That was my point repeatedly, too. Especially if going into Flight Mode degrades speech understanding. To save battery, if low on juice, it might be better just to turn the hearing aids completely off until needed again unless frequent rebooting takes more juice that just leaving HA’s in flight mode.
Just as another control, I found it quite easy to put my old rechargeable Quattros in flight mode by holding down the power buttons > 9 seconds. The Quattros then disappear from the Smart 3D status display, don’t show up in the 3D Find My Hearing Aids applet, and aren’t detectable by a BT scanner, unlike my disposable battery-powered Omnia 962s. So, there’s something wrong with my replaceable battery-powered Omnia 962s and flight mode.
The Quattro manual has 14 references to “flight,” whereas the Omnia manual has only six. The Quattro manual mentions the feature has to be turned on by one’s HCP, whereas the Omnia manual neglects to mention that. Neither manual suggests going into flight mode to preserve battery power for critical needs later in the day (having a portable battery charger or using disposable batteries is clearly a better option, as you won’t have to sacrifice the best HA function in flight mode). The Quattro manual also mentions that flight mode may be useful in areas where RF transmission is prohibited, but the Omnia manual doesn’t (there used to be zones where you were told to turn off your car radio because explosives were in use - that might have been vacuum tube days! Turning off wireless transmission at a secure installation might be another consideration).
Thanks for mentioning this consideration, Bruce. Given that thought, it’s amazing that ReSound doesn’t have flight mode turned on by default. If you’re used to leaving your HA function on in flight in the U.S. but then travel to a far-off locale and the flight attendant tells you that you have to put your HA’s in flight mode, you’d be screwed by having flight mode turned off by default in the U.S.A. version of Smart Fit and no HCP available to change the fitting setting. There’d be a lot of frustration before you just decided to turn your HA’s off as required by the flight attendant.
So now, if I ever find myself on a flight taking off in East Globalquerque and am told to put my Omnia 962s in flight mode by the attendant, I know from the start I’ll just have to turn them off!
Wow I have missed a lot since the last time I was online. Let me only reply to @jim_lewis and everyone else please feel free to intervene
If running in Airplane Mode did make a big difference, why wouldn’t ReSound want to advertise it? They advertise that you get a longer battery life when you don’t stream. The HA’s, AFAIK, function perfectly well without a BT connection to my iPhone (I’ve lost the connection occasionally and haven’t noticed until I checked the Smart 3D app). I’m sure one will save some battery life, but the math on the 37.5 hr runtime in flight mode you calculate is not a “50%” increase. 7.5 hr increase / 30 hr runtime without streaming is a 25% increase in runtime over that advertised by ReSound. And if your 7.5 extra hrs were correct, 7.5 / 37.5 = 20% of available runtime, i.e., if turning on Flight Mode does completely shut off BT, then BT is only consuming 20% of the battery charge during normal operation with some level of sound input taken for granted by ISO standards.
You cannot compare my projected 37.5 hr to the Resound 30 hr. My measure was that with HA flight mode on, 40% battery lasted for 15 hr; and without flight mode, 60% for this 15 hr (no streaming at all in both tests). The ratio is 50% gain. All other numbers are just projected, and the ratio must be kept. Specifically, with flight mode on, 40% battery = 15 hr, then (projected) 100% battery = 37.5 hr; no flight mode, 60% battery = 15 hr, then (projected) 100% = 25 hr.
If you argue that your measure is wrong because Resound told us it must be 30 hr in the 2nd test, okay maybe in my tests, the HA was activated much more than when Resound tested their HA. But, then, if we were to place my HA in the same condition of Resound to go up to 30 hr in the test with HA flight mode off, the same time increase will be observed with HA flight mode on (specifically, if I were to scale my time from 25 hr to 30 hr, my 37.5 hr will be scaled to 45 hr). And, therefore, this does not change the ratio 50% in my tests.
And now, you can use these numbers to project how much BT consume in normal operation like you have done. But, don’t forget that you have just projected the consumption of BT in idle mode.
Now I will address your rhetoric question
If running in Airplane Mode did make a big difference, why wouldn’t ReSound want to advertise it? They advertise that you get a longer battery life when you don’t stream.
The rule of thumb is that you only advertise something that either (1) gives you competitive advantage or (2) is mandatory.
Does turning HA flight mode on give Resound the advantage? No, it is true for all HA with wireless features. Is it mandatory? No, of course. This is the same reason that Resound not advertise that the Li-Ion battery of 961R will degrade after some years (the reason that made you choose 962).
The same logic, Resound did not “advertise that you get a longer battery life when you don’t stream”, they rather state that “if you found your HA lasted less than our announced 30 hr, it may be due to the streaming, and we have no reasonability for that”.
@Morgan1946
Way too much over thinking on this…
@jim_lewis
That was my point repeatedly, too. Especially if going into Flight Mode degrades speech understanding.
I do not disagree. However, it is better know all options we can have instead of accepting only what we have been told. As I have said above, I will probably choose 612 and pack several 13 packs with me during my travel.
Nevertheless, I would like to say that turning my HA flight mode to disable all wireless features, I do not see any difference in speech understanding. Not at all!
Does this mean that all the advertised “intelligent speech enhancement” is really worthless? Or maybe we need very good ears (which we of course don’t have in the first place right?) to hear the very “improvement” if the features using wireless components are on?!
If anyone find that they have difficulty understand speech with HA flight mode on, please tell me.
Feel free to tell me if there is any point that I forgot to address.
I have no knowledge of the wireless functions of the Omnia aids.
Of possible interest is near field magnetic interface (NFMI) that is one of the two wireless communications modes used in Oticon aids. In my More 1 aids, the instruction manual states that flight mode disables Bluetooth completely. NFMI is used for mode selection and volume and other functions in the More so putting one aid into flight mode triggers the other to go to flight mode. NFMI in the More aids operates at 3.84 MHz and very low power (below 15 nW) as compared to Bluetooth LE and MFI at about 2.5 GHz and below 9 mW.
I wonder if the Omnia uses NFMI as well as Bluetooth?
Hi,
Getting a new set, given choice of Resound Omnia 961 or Starkey Evolv AI 2400 R.
Any opinion or advise. I find the Starkey has higher gain, for the Resound, always must set the volume level up to near max to match the stakey level9.
hi,
for the Audiogram below, should the RIC use be the HP or MP, as both have the curve within the supported range.
Medium power would be ok, which ones are you using at the moment? But it’s quite possible to use Power on the right and MP on the left.
Currently using the HP ric on both side. This is uncles audio, he say the volume level is low even at max selection on the resound control app.
His report show max VC is 6, so he might need to ask his audio to increase the max to 12.
The min is set to -12.
Oh I see, but yes definitely get the Audiology clinic to increase the overall gains, but do check the wax filters just in case they are blocked.