I thought it would be helpful for others choosing new hearing aids to benefit from my experience of trialing new hearing aids to buy, particularly as today I have finally been able to fix a longstanding issue (or rather find the cause of it) that I had with my old Oticon hearing aids.
Contenders:
Current - Oticon Opn S1
New - Oticon Intent 1
New - Widex Allure 440
Setting up the hearing aids
I noticed that both seemed a lot louder than my old hearing aids - especially hearing myself talking! I suspect the issue is more that because I had the volume reduced on my old aids when getting them as it was too loud initially!
Widex Allure 440 - took only a minute or so to configure for my ears as everything is now automated and cloud based. Audiologist now has very limited control - although that will apparently be fixed in future updates.
Oticon Intent 1 - He did a sensogram or something like that manually, but it only took a minute or two. So for setting up time, no real difference between the aids for setting up for new ears!
The mould for Widex seems to be a bit smaller than Oticon. But both seem to be comfortable to wear. I went with Silver colours for both aids to get a change from the standard boring beige brown that I always used to get.
Who wins on initial wearing?
Now, this turned out to be a surprise because I was expecting that Oticon would win this because I am used to their old opn model. But it turns out, that I was actually happier with Widex which unexpectedly solved a problem that I have had for years with my current (OPN) hearing aids. If you look at my very first posts - some 7 years ago - I was complaining that the right hearing aid always seemed to be louder than the left hearing aid and I never really got this satisfactorily addressed - I think largely because my previous audio did not have enough training to be able to identify what the problem was.
I will point out that the new Oticon Intent 1 hearing aids have the exact same problem in that the right aid sounded much louder than the left one. What is going on Oticon!
It turns out that Widex supplied both left and right with 1.5mm vents in my custom moulds, whereas Oticon (in their wisdom) has supplied 1.5mm vent in my right hearing aid and 3mm vent in my left hearing aid - for both new and current hearing aids. My new audio, being a lot brighter and obviously more clued up was able to pick up that the difference in vent sizing is the reason why there always appeared to be a volume differential between the two ears.
From chatting to Chatgpt, it seems that Oticon has a fitting rationale of open and natural sound as much as possible, which is why they fitted my left aid for 3mm to give as much natural sound as possible and because of a risk of feedback are forced to make the right one only 1.5mm vent.
However, this creates several problems.
- There is a volume mismatch (that can never be resolved) between the two ears.
- Wearing the new Oticon hearing aids - I still can’t hear what someone is saying in the next room properly if they ask me for example if I want coffee!
- It feels like the right aid is switched on with a clear, loud active perception and the left aid is switched off, making it feel distant, hollow or passive.
- Last, but not least, I think because Oticon aim for natural sounding as much as possible and are too focused on higher frequencies for speech understanding are too conservative for when to boost lower frequencies and as result I think my left ear is simply not getting the amplification it needs because I am using a 3mm vent when I probably should be using a 1.5mm vent in the left ear as I am losing too much of the lower frequencies so I can’t hear coffee orders!
I have only worn the Widex for a few minutes while setting up, as my intention is to trial the new Oticon for one week first and then trial the Widex for the second week because you have to train your ears for each aid a bit. But in the short time I was wearing the Widex - which uses 1.5mm vents in both ears - for the first time in years, I felt like the volume was balanced in both ears. For that alone, I am prepared to buy the Widex! Widex definitely wins on first fit!
Well done Widex. I am really pleased to finally solve a mystery that never got resolved with my old Oticon hearing aids. They only really managed to somewhat mitigate the problem.
My new audiologist
Despite my concerns about the new Oticon hearing aids, I have to say - day 1 fitting - the hearing aids are so much better configured than day 1 fitting of my old hearing aids using the previous audio. My new one definitely is much better - despite my complaints about the Oticon vent mismatch issue.
I can hear properly with my new Oticon aids. It took me months to get to a point where my old opn were fully functional. This guy is considerably better than the previous audio.
How do my new Oticon (which is what I am trialing first) sound?
I am finding that it sounds slightly more metallic/clackety etc than I am used to. However, I don’t know if this is how it is supposed to sound or whether my old hearing aids were configured correctly for how things sound. For example, clapping my hands sounds sharper, but flat - there is even less reverberance (or bass) than on my old hearing aids. As for the keyboard - I am either going to have to get another keyboard or take the hearing aids out when I type (if I keep the Oticon). It sounds terrible. My old aids, the keyboard was a bit clackety, but had a bit more bass sound to it. I am not sure how to tell which aids are actually reproducing accurate sound as I know you have to adjust your ears for different aids. But bearing in mind Oticon’s insistence on highlighting high frequencies for speech understanding I suspect that this may be the underlying cause.
I will say, that I am not convinced that I am hearing any better with the new Oticons compared to my old ones. I will have to give it more time. But I suspect the underlying problem is because both new and old suffer from the same problem - 3mm vent in left ear (when it probably should be 1.5mm to boost lower frequencies) and the mismatch of 1.5mm in the right ear.
Comfortableness of both aids
The new Oticon Intent 1 is slightly thicker/fatter than the old OPN, but I have no problems wearing them. Might be an issue if you wear glasses. The cables to the mould fit comfortably. So far, it actually seems more comfortable to wear than my old Oticon ones to be honest.
I have not worn the Widex aids long enough to give a proper review. I will update this post to review the Widex next week. I will shortly be able to review the Oticon with TV Streamer!
I am planning to trial all three hearing aids watching tv (without streamer) to see which hearing aids I can hear the dialogue best with.
Preliminary conclusion
Maybe I am not the best fit for wearing Oticon (despite wearing the OPN S1 for 7 years). I feel a bit annoyed that Oticon think its ok to provide different size vents in left/right when other people besides myself must surely experience the exact same problems that I have experienced with volume mismatch and feeling like the one side is switched off etc.
I also think that Oticon may be too conservative with lower frequencies (in their focus on higher frequencies for understanding speech) because even with the new aids, I still cannot hear someone in the next room asking something - when everyone else in the room hears clearly! When I trial the Widex (which has 1.5mm vents for both ears), I will confirm whether I can actually hear someone in the next room properly and come back to this point. My gut feeling is that my left ear has never been properly amplified because of their insistence on reducing amplification in order to reduce the feeling of everything being too loud and this keyboard now sounds god awful to type on!
One big point in Oticon’s favour
I have been a (mostly) happy Oticon wearer for the last 7 years as Oticon did solve a problem that I had with my then previous hearing aids which were Resound! I found Resound too loud, with a lot of fatigue from over sensory stimulation and I was delighted when the end of the working day came, so I could pull the hearing aids out. I never had that issue with Oticon - you can wear them all day long and you don’t feel that sensory over stimulation that I used to get with Resound. Resound was exhausting to wear to be honest.
I say this, because I was largely happy with Oticon for the last 7 years despite the unresolved issues that I had. To a large extent I heard very well in all environments with the old Oticon and I did not tire wearing them. So, while I am more favouring Widex - it really is down to primarily the mismatch with vent sizes I would say - although possibly too much treble - judging by this keyboard. So don’t write off the Oticon based on this review. The old aids (were not perfect), but to be very fair, I was fully able to cope with all listening environments - home and work quite satisfactorily and never felt like I constantly had to ask people to repeat themselves. I just have criticism of the Oticon fitting rationale as it did create problems as explained.
Oticon - if you read posts
- Consider more research on matching vent sizes versus natural sound. I speak from 7 years of experience - mismatched vent sizes don’t work because it always sounds like a volume mismatch and I could never tell where sound was coming from!
- Your hearing aids are the only hearing aids that I have experienced the problem where I cannot understand what someone is saying in the next room - because I am sure both times you have supplied me with the wrong vent size for my hearing loss in the left ear because you want natural open sound and I suspect it is not sufficient lower frequency boost for my left ear.
Hopefully this review is of help to others choosing hearing aids. I will update as my trial progresses - I am only on day 1. If you have any questions - ask away. I will do my best to get a proper trial of both.