Rexton BiCore or Philips 9040 for listening to music (not streaming)?

Hearing Aids
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#1

Hello -
I’m a newbie about to purchase my first hearing aids. I’ve got age-related high frequency hearing loss; my hearing is pretty decent up to about 2Khz, but then drops off fairly rapidly with a big dip around 4Khz. I’ve done a lot of research, and will be getting my hearing aids from Costco.

My primary concern is that the hearing aids sound as natural as possible and improve my ability to enjoy listening to music over loudspeakers or headphones (I’m not interested in streaming audio through the hearing aids). I also want to improve my ability to hear my very soft-spoken wife in relatively quiet environments, but I assume that any high quality hearing aid will be able to help with this. I’ve always disliked noisy environments, so am less concerned about hearing conversations in loud settings. I’m also not concerned about using the hearing aids for phone conversations.

I’m aware of the requirements for setting up a music program in a hearing aid - disable directional microphones, turn off noise reduction, minimize dynamic and frequency compression, etc. I’m also aware of the importance of latency, since I’ll be fitted with open domes and will hear sounds below 1-2Khz “naturally” and will rely on the HA’s to augment the higher frequencies.

Two questions: I will probably go with either the Rexton BiCore (presumably identical to the Signia Pure Charge&Go AX) or the Philips Hearlink 9040. I understand that both of these units have music programs, but can anyone advise which offers the most control and is most effective? Also, does anyone know which of these two units has lower latency? The Philips manual states that latency is 8.2ms, which is mediocre, but I wonder if this figure is measured with all the processing turned on and might be lower when running a music program with most of the processing turned off. Rexton only says latency for the Bicores is “<15ms,” which is unhelpful since I’m guessing any high quality hearing aid would be less than 15ms.

Thanks in advance for any advice about which of these units is likely to be most suitable for my needs.

#2

Hi there, no one can tell you which HAs are best for you, only you’ll know which one is, and only after you trial them, unfortunately how people perceive sounds is totally different for everyone.

Widex have the best latency at the moment with “Pure Sound” unfortunately Costco don’t stock them.

#3

I think that either Philips or Rexton could work for you. You won’t know until you try them.

Rexton should be receiving an upgrade some time within the next couple of months to put them on par with the latest Signia IX platform which was introduced last summer. So, if I were you, I’d try the Philips first. If you like them, then great! You’ve got what you need. If you’re not pleased with them, then you can try the Rextons, which by that time should be upgraded to the latest technology. Good luck.

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#4

With your hearing loss, I would try using open domes or what Philips uses called open bass domes.

I don’t think it’s going to matter which hearing aid you select. One individual said that the Rexton has more adjustments that can be made.

Note that the latest and greatest hearing aids will all come with Auracast in the next year or two. That’s something to consider.

#5

if I was you I would try Widex micro CIC Moment 400

#6

I got my first hearing aids in December - Philips 9040 from Costco. I am no professional musician and not even a knowledgeable audiophile, but hearing music well is important to me (especially classical music on radio and live concerts). My hearing loss is also more significant in the high frequencies but starts tailing off earlier than yours, so we may not have identical experiences, but overall I am very happy with the Philips for music listening. But I only became happy once the audiologist installed the music program, which is called “hifi music” in the Philips system. On the general program (which is what I find best for day-to-day life) it was not what I would consider acceptable. Some things I would advise from my own experience, some of which may be applicable no matter which aids you get:

  • You really must get the audiologist to install the music program straight away (you are already aware of this but I can say that with these aids it honestly makes a huge difference)

  • Since these are your first aids, you likely won’t be able to fine tune everything in the first fitting - everything will sound weird and different. My initial impression after going straight to a work meeting an hour after getting them (my audiologist is of the opinion that you should have gain and volume set to the most appropriate settings right from the start and not start off soft to ease you in gradually) was WHY IS EVERYBODY SHOUTING and WHY DOES MY BREATHING SOUND LIKE DARTH VADER. So you really will need a couple of days to get used to them and test out different listening experiences, so plan a followup visit with the audiologist where you can revisit the settings after your brain has adjusted and you know what works.

  • Do install the phone app - while I’ve read that it’s not the most programmable, it does allow you to adjust volume and also switch between the different programs very easily - you don’t even have to do it from the program but can access those settings from the notification shade pull-down thing, It also has two different equalizers, one for listening to external sounds and one for streaming, which you can set independently and set differently for each of the installed programs. Personally I found I had to decrease the high frequencies in the equalizer when I was using the music program because leaving them on default made the high sounds very harsh and prominent, but decreasing it meant I could still hear them but it sounded more natural. This depends a bit how the audiologist has programmed your aids in the first place, but the point is you do have some adjustment possible yourself. An additional benefit of the app is that you can do a remote session with the audiologist where they can connect to your aids to add/remove programs and do some adjustments - this may work instead of a return visit if getting to Costco is difficult.

  • I don’t have any info about latency but I can say it hasn’t been an issue for me in my listening even though I am also mainly using my preserved hearing in the lower frequencies. This at least is something you would become aware of very quickly so you could easily return them if you don’t find it acceptable.

Like you I was also interested in hearing comparisons from people between the models Costco offers, but they seem to be hard to find - Costco doesn’t offer demos and most people seem to go for one or the other and stick with it. I’m happy with the Philips, but as these are my first aids I have nothing to compare them to, so I also still wonder to myself whether one of the other models would be EVEN better. But the only way of doing that with Costco is to actually return the first set and get the new ones, which seems like a hassle even though their return policy and warranty is actually great and overall I have been very happy with the Costco experience and price. One thing I was wondering is why you have taken the Jabras out of the equation already - those were the others I was interested in myself.

Good luck!

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#7

Thank you all for the replies!

Tenkan and Liviu, Widex Moments would definitely be my first choice to start with, everything else being equal. I’ve seen multiple reports from musicians saying that they had better experiences with Widex than with other hearing aids, and their latency is way lower than any other brand. There is at least one audiologist in my city that specializes in fitting hearing aids for musicians, and of course they carry Widex. But the cost would be probably 3-4 times the cost of a hearing aid from Costco. Since I’ve never worn hearing aids before, my thought is to see how I do with one of the brands available at Costco and in any case spend some time training my ears to get used to wearing aids. If after 6 months they are not working for me, I’ll bite the bullet and spend the money to go to an audi who specializes in music and would probably fit me with the Widex.

Billgem, I was aware that Rexton was likely to come out with a new model based on the Signia IX, but excellent point that this could be an argument for starting with the Philips.

Raetee, thank you for your detailed comments. Yup, I know that it’s going to take some time - probably weeks - before my brain begins to adapt to the hearing aids and that fitting them is an iterative process… Good question about why I didn’t mention the Jabra Pro 20. I guess I’m trying to narrow things down. I’m interested in the Rexton Bicores because they are rebadged Signia Ax, which frequently seem to come up as a second choice to Widex in discussions about hearing aids for musicians. And I’m interested in the Philips 9040 because the hearing aid specialist that I’m working with at Costco seems to think it would the one most likely to fit my needs. I’m certainly open to the Jabras if the Costco specialist or anyone here suggests that it might be the best place to start.

Just to follow up on one of my initial questions: am I correct that Philips, Rexton, and Jabra hearing aids all have music programs that are functionally equivalent and offer similar control over the various things that one would want to turn off or minimize when listening to music? If one of these hearing aids offers a music program substantially more useful than the others, that would be a reason for me to choose that hearing aid as a starting point.

#8

Good point. I don’t know about the other hearing aids but the Philips app is fairly limited and only allows you to adjust lows, mids and highs through the graphic equalizer interface, and of course volume as well. All the other things that make a difference (background noise suppression, feedback, directionality and so on) are only adjustable through the Philips software that the audiologist has access to - you’d need to become a DIY enthusiast and get the Noahlink device that’s mentioned quite a lot in these forums to be able to have full control. My understanding is that the music programs tend to all be set to have all the stuff that could affect the way the music gets to your ears set to “off”, so to that extent you could say they’re “equivalent”, but it may be that some of the other apps do actually let you control some of it yourself without getting fully into DIY - others may have more info and I think I recall reading some threads with more detail about the music programs, but how much programming you can do yourself I really don’t know.

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#9

If you want to do this properly then you’ll need a DIY project, the App is far too limited in this regard.

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#10

Yes, apps don’t seem to do that much in my limited experience.

#11

Apologies - my last question wasn’t clear. Thanks for confirming my understanding that the consumer-facing apps offer very little user control over the music functions. However, I actually meant to ask whether one of these companies (Rexton, Philips, Jabra) offers a music program that might provide the audiologist fitting the hearing aid with greater flexibility in creating/adjusting the music settings compared with the music programs offered by the other two companies. Or do all three companies have music programs that are roughly the same in what they allow the audiologist to do?

#12

My Signia Ax aids (Rexton) has a built in musicians program. this last had to be adjusted by audi to make it work. My audi had to call Signia for help navigating the features to adjust them. but it can easily be done.

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#13

I may be mistaken as I really am a newbie to all this and don’t do any DIY myself but I think that once the audiologist connects to the hearing aids and uses their dedicated software, they have the full flexibility that the software allows for all the aid’s features, and the “programs” that are selected are kind of just a starting point with various parameters configured in a particular way but can be further adjusted to meet the user’s needs. So if you add the “music” program to the user’s profile it’s a good starting point because all the things you usually want for listening to music (mics set to omnidirectional, feedback suppression off, gain set to a certain level in the frequencies that are most important for music etc.) are already preset that way (no matter which aid you choose), but I suspect you could start with any program and make the same adjustments (e.g. starting withe the general program but changing the mic settings and the feedback settings and so on) to come to the same end result - it’s just you’d have to toggle 20 feature switches in the software instead of 2 or something. And then of course you can make any other tweaks with the amount of amplification at different frequencies and all that kind of thing to meet the user’s specific needs. So I guess the question is whether some of the aids have more adjustability inherent in the software, or whether it is some feature of the aid itself (hardware-related or sound-processing related) that ends up making one aid better than another for music for user X. My suspicion is that it’s the latter - that all the software suites for all the aids offer a similar amount of adjustability, but after a certain point, it’s going to be down to the limitations of the aid itself (as well as the user’s specific hearing profile) whether it ends up sounding the way the user wants. I’m not sure I’m explaining myself clearly, but basically my feeling is you’re much less likely to hear an audiologist say “I can’t make that adjustment because the software doesn’t allow it” and much more likely to hear them say “I made that adjustment but you tell me it still doesn’t sound the way you want, and that’s probably because these aids just have these limitations”. Others here have far more experience and can say if I’m wrong that the music programs are essentially just a preset that let you get to the settings that are (usually) best for music more quickly.

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#14

Yes, and Rexton Bicores are identical to Signia AX. They also have 3 different receiver options. The power receiver is best for delivering the full range of sound for music.

#15

I was surprised to see that the app now offered a sound equalizer and did find that others had it on their 9030’s. Since I DIY I went to the latest software and found that the instrument firmware updater was grayed out. I have done at least one firmware update last year but I’ve heard I need a new one for this feature. Someone on a youtube post said that they called Philips recently and Philips is currently not offering this update so maybe that’s why my instrument updater is grayed out. The updater is also the only way that I can see to determine what firmware I currently have. I think I need 1.1.0 to be able to have the sound and streaming equalizer with the latest app. I currently only have the streaming equalizer. I might have to ask Costco about this.

#16

On my 9040s I have firmware v1.1.0, and my app is version (8012)1.2.2. I have the two equalizers and find both very very useful as I don’t DIY.

#17

Yes that’s the firmware you need. I have the same app, but don’t know my firmware level since I think you can only find that if you can run the instrument updater. Is that right? My updater is currently grayed out for some reason in the Philips Hearsuit software. I’ll probably ask CostCo to see if they can check my firmware because I did find some 9030 owners that had the two equalizers.

#18

I see my firmware version in the app - in the bottom bar I have 3 buttons: sound, hearing aids, and more. If I click hearing aids, I see an item called hearing aid updates - this says “No new updates in the app. Your hearing aids are already updated. However, your hearing care professional may recommend further updates during a visit.” Then it says “current version: 1.1.0.” I can’t update it, but I can’t tell if that’s because it’s the latest version or because it can only be updated using hearsuite, which I don’t have. Definitely worth speaking to Costco as the sound equalizer is also helpful. Perhaps less essential if you have already got your settings exactly the way you want them, but even then useful if you want different settings for different listening types (e.g. upping the bass for one music type and decreasing it for another).