Curious minds want to, know?
WH
_
2 Likes
As the originator of this thread I’ll chime in. As with most conspiracy theories, the explanations are usually more mundane. My reason for not participating is that my wife is battling a very serious cancer and I just don’t have the time that I used to have.
With regard to my Whisper hearing aids, they continue to perform very effectively to the point that I’m hardly aware that they’re there. No problems with feedback here. My only complaint is that they eat batteries. I’m looking forward to a rechargeable version.
One piece of good news is that Whisper ha worked out a way to apply insurance coverage to the subscription to lower the cost, which is a nice benefit indeed.
5 Likes
@billgem: Thanks for your input, Bill - you already know that I’m rooting for you guys!
Best
SpudGunner
1 Like
What is that? I wear Phonaks with the typical silicone power dome. Are yours custom-sized?
Usually feedback is a function of the FIT of the in-ear dome or ear mold combined with the level of POWER needed to boost volume. So, for me, both custom-molded plastic aids and the softer silicone domes will have feedback if they aren’t seated in my ear canal properly OR if they manage to slip out a bit (which they do 1,000 times a day - like having to push one’s glasses up!).
I also wonder what’s causing the Whisper feedback that it can be fixed with just a firmware upgrade, as again the squeaky leakage is pretty much due to physical FIT from what I’ve experienced.
1 Like
Just want to say that even though I don’t know you or your wife, I empathize with your situation and hope your wife is in comfort. Thank you for sharing your insights on the Whisper trial, too.
No. All I was saying about the Phonak domes is that my Audi did not use the standard Whisper domes. Judging by the pictures on their website, they appear to be open domes, so I assume that my Audi used Phonak domes instead because Open domes are not appropriate for me. When I say that they were modified, all that refers to is that he cut slits in the domes and trimmed them a little bit because I felt too occluded.
1 Like
I’ll have some more info to post soon. My Whisper trial ended up being extended. I had to cancel audi appointments due to a very mild but still highly contagious bout with Covid.
2 Likes
@ziploc: Zip! Covid? Are you okay? Thanks for checking in - I’m looking forward to reading more about your Whisper experience.
1 Like
Thankfully it was mild @ziploc, hopefully all are now recovered in your household…. Cheers Kev 
1 Like
Ah, GOT IT! I also require closed domes with my hearing loss, and oddly, I’ve found that even the shape of the dome matters! The domes sold with my older Phonak Audeo B-Direct aids was a double-decker “power dome” tapered like a Xmas tree. But the Phonak Marvels I wear now are also double-decker “power domes” with a shape like two stacked umbrellas - MUCH wider and shallower in the dome cups.
I’ve tested the Marvels out with the older Xmas tree domes and the newer brolly domes. Turns out these Marvels sound MUCH better with the umbrella-shaped domes. No idea why, cuz they don’t really fit in my ear canal but perhaps the larger, umbrella cup creates a better seal to prevent feedback.
I aplaud your audi’s creativity with the domes! Whatever WORKS for ya! 
RE: feedback. I have to remind myself that wax in the ear canal can cause feedback issues for me.
I’m happy to hear that the Whisper trial-ers aren’t out assassinating world leaders and competing HA brand CEOs.
We just visited our son and daughter-in-law and grandson for the first time since October. I even broke a months-long New York Times crossword puzzle streak rather than get distracted by the phone.
Whisper Brain battery life looks like 16-20 hours now, extrapolating from the numbers I’ve seen. Longer in quiet conditions, shorter with more noise, like traveling. I see no reason why a juice box wouldn’t work if one needed more time.
At home I change Whisper earpiece batteries every 3 days, else they die on the 4th day. On this trip I changed them every other day.
I had Whisper feedback problems with ReSound power domes. My audiologist intern fitter blamed Whisper’s strong high frequency boost. Signia sleeves were better (conformed better to my ear canal cross-section) but they worked their way out. Now I’m wearing flexible silicone molds and feedback is gone.
I disagree that conventional aids have feedback management “in the bag”. If they did, then they wouldn’t have to do feedback calibration. But feedback suppression has a cost, as does reducing high frequency gain. So they do only as much as necessary for a given fitting.
Re wax, not Whisper-related, but when I told my fitter that the wax filters in my molds were filling up practically daily, because there’s no dome deflecting the wax, she suggested simply using an ear syringe to spray warm water daily into each ear. I do that every night, and I’m finding far, far less wax on my molds. Will see how much accumulation she finds on my next visit.
1 Like
I’m sure this is fine for most people. I’ve had reconstructive surgery on both ears due to childhood cholesteotoma. An ear syringe is very,very counterindicated, as in, never use one. My middle ear is right there, exposed, and would come under a high pressure spray. So, I’m just saying, since many here have had such surgeries, be sure that an ear syringe is safe FOR YOU.
1 Like
Perhaps Jim (@SpudGunner) was thinking about the new Oticon feedback technology and assumed that it’s part of the conventional feedback management which requires calibration which you mentioned here. But just to clarify, in the Oticon OPN, it only has the conventional (reactive) feedback management system that requires calibration, much like the rest of the industry. But starting with the OPN S and carried on forward with the More, Oticon has a new feedback prevention (proactive instead of reactive) technology (called OpenSound Optimizer and MoreSound Optimizer) that does not require calibration. It senses the potential onset of possible feedback and automatically inserts STM (Spectro-Temporal Modulation) signals to disrupt the positive loop gain and break the potential feedback build-up even before it occurs.
I know this is a Whisper thread and not an Oticon thread, so I don’t mean to side track anything here. I just want to clarify the little back-and-forth about whether the industry really has the feedback suppression technology in the bag yet or not. In my opinion, the Oticon Optimizer feedback prevention technolog for the OPN S and the More is not conventional feedback management, and it’s supposed to put feedback issues away in the bag more or less. It’s not perfect, but Oticon has put some fixes in to help manage the warbling side effect that some people may hear due to it.
1 Like
@Volusiano: Yes, Mr V, that’s exactly the case. In my defense, let me just point out how limited is my experience with makes other than Oticon.
In 16 years, I have worn 4 pairs of HAs, 3 of which have been Oticon. I assume that all the other brands are pretty much the same with respect to the basics like feedback suppression. Your post demonstrates that this is simply not the case … Oticon does, in fact, have something different.
I’ve been a bit confused by what is meant by “feedback” in these situations. I thought that the term applied to the noise that occurs when two earpieces are close together, but what I’ve experienced with the Whispers is a persistent background buzzing noise while I’m wearing the hearing aids that seems to occur with certain kinds of music or just driving in the car (with no music). This is alleviated to a considerable extent by switching to the “music” program, but not entirely.
What I’ve found really strange is that under certain circumstances, the buzzing will start and then continue even after the stimulus sound has disappeared!
I’ve been told by Whisper that they expect this to be fixed in the next firmware update. Has anyone noticed that one can no longer see the firmware version number in version 2 of the Whisper app?
Like @x475aws, I’m really looking forward to a rechargeable model. There’s no battery indicator for the earpieces (until battery is very low, unlike for the Brain), so there’s no easy way of knowing how much charge is left.
Feedback is when you have a microphone and a speaker which amplifies the sound picked up by the mic in close proximity such that a loop is created whereby the sound generated by the speaker is picked up by the mic again, then amplified to the speaker to be picked up by the mic again, forming a vicious cycle of continued amplified sound until things get saturated and very loud. Sometimes when you hold up your hand near your ear, for example, it can help block the partially escaped sound generated by the receiver inside your canal outward and bounce it right back into the mic, creating a feedback loop. Sometimes, if the amplification is strong enough (like for a worse hearing loss), a feedback loop can just occur on its own because the mic and receiver are in close enough proximity without needing help from anything to bounce the sound back into the mic.
It’s not really when 2 ear pieces are close together because the sound picked up by the mic in one ear piece does not amplify the speaker in the other ear piece. A feedback loop is not possible going from one ear piece to the other. A feedback loop is only within a single ear piece.
What you’re hearing (a buzzing noise whether when there’s a certain type of sound going on or not) can also be feedback as well, but then it can be something else as well. It’s hard to say. A stimulus can start a feedback loop, but once started, it’s possible for the stimulus to disappear, but the feedback can still carry on because the build up of the feedback loop might have gathered enough momentum already to feed into itself without any external stimulus needed anymore.
3 Likes
All this brings back evil memories of Nyquist and Bode from a particular course in college. Control theory and the freq domain. Ugh.
WH