Widex Allure 440 vs Oticon Intent 1 Trial and Review

Hearing Aids
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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.

  1. There is a volume mismatch (that can never be resolved) between the two ears.
  2. 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!
  3. 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.
  4. 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

  1. 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!
  2. 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.

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I would def have a chat with the audiologist about getting that left oticon mold fixed. Not a fair trial if you know something major is broken. And that is.

WH

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I will definitely be speaking to the audiologist on Monday after giving the Oticon more time to try out over the weekend.

I will state that he did actually adjust the right aid so that my voice does not sound quite so loud and boomy in the right ear compared to the left.

Having worn them at a restaurant last night and at home where we had visitors and watching tv, I will amend my statement about the Oticon volume mismatch.

The main issue with the new aids is more the occlusion effect of the RHS versus the LHS. That’s why my voice sounds louder in the right than left. As far as sounds coming from everywhere else around me, as far as I can determine the volume is almost perfectly balanced between the ears in the sense that the right doesn’t really sound much louder than the left. This is a massive improvement over the old Oticon where especially high frequencies such as the beeping sound at the pedestrian crossing is much louder in the right than left on the old aids.

In short, the new aids are much better than the old ones in terms of volume balance (not perfect) for general sounds around me. Changing the vent to a 1.5mm for the left ear should hopefully help to balance the volume differential in terms of the occlusion effect (how loud my voice sounds in each ear) and hopefully address the issue where I still can’t quite hear what people are saying in the next room - which I think I should be able to hear.

Having said that, while I was in the restaurant (which was noisy), I found that I was able to follow about 98% of the conversation at the table. I suspect I missed no more conversation than a normal hearing user - as we all have lapses of attention. The right did sound a tad louder than the left - especially the crashing of cutlery in the background - but all in all, I felt I could hear without strain and I did not have to increase the volume of the left ear like I usually did for the old hearing aids! So, actually the volume mismatch is more down to the occlusion imbalance perception now than anything else.

I am still getting used to the way these hearing aids sound as they are different and I guess it’s just a case of training the ears for the new sound profile. It is possible, that when I change the vent size in the left one, that will boost the bass sufficiently so that the keyboard doesn’t sound quite so annoying. The sound is not trebly per se, but I think there is a slight lack of bass for certain vowels in speech when watching tv.

The hearing aids are growing on me though. I am able to hear quite well with these aids - watching tv, in the garden chatting to people and at the restaurant - the new Oticons are definitely handling the challenge. So, from that point, Oticon are certainly achieving the intended goal. I can hear properly in every environment I have tried bar the coffee orders factor! Obviously this is the most important concern obviously and given that I have no other issues with the hearing aids, this is really good news for the Oticon. I have no feedback, no buzzing noises, no issues whatsoever. Brilliant.

So, currently I would be more than happy to buy the Oticon (once the vent imbalance is fixed) because these are much better setup than my old ones. I think it needs very slight tweaking, which may actually be addressed with the vent size change - who knows!

I would be happy to recommend the Oticon Intent and my audiologist as these ones are better than my old ones, although naturally it needs slight tweaking as its never a perfect fit from day one.

This evening I will be testing all three aids for watching tv to see how well I can hear speech at a volume set by my sister (who has very good hearing). That should be a really good test. Will update soon.

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I would not consider the left mould broken because of the vent size mismatch. It just creates an unexpected feeling that the right is switched on and the left not - despite the fact that the left is clearly switched on and can be demonstrated by simply removing the left aid. The occlusion imbalance just creates a perception where it feels wrong. Anyway, I will ask the audio if he can change the vent size to the mould or if I have to get a new mould. Thanks

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I have a pair of Widex Moments. It is possible, by using the app, to have a different volume for each ear. This may be possible with the Oticon app too?

With my Widex moments, they were originally programmed to the Widex standard and I found that cutlery and doors, for example, were far too loud. I discovered that the aids could be programmed to NAL-NAL2 instead, and I found this a lot better.
For me - that is, different people will get different results

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I’m not saying there is a physical fracture. I’m saying the situation is broken and not a fair test of what you intend to test. The test tells you little because it is not set up appropriately.

WH

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Did you give it a few weeks for your ears to acclimate to the new volume of cutlery etc. The problem for everyone is that when they get new aids, everything sounds too loud. I am prepared to try wearing the aids for 3-4 weeks before reducing the volume on any side because otherwise you end up not being able to hear as optimally as you could.

I am already finding - although it is still bloody annoying - the keyboard is less irritating today than it was yesterday! On the whole, I am finding that the hearing aids are not too loud in general, just in very noisy environments, it’s just a bit louder than I am used to with my old aids. Having worn the Intents for a couple of days now and being fortunate enough to test them in restaurants, shopping and sitting in the garden with various people, I have found that I don’t seem to be experiencing any real issues hearing people properly. So, however he has set it up (while not perfect because of the vent size mismatch), they are actually working pretty well. I have no idea what profile he has set me up for, but if it ain’t broke!

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Noted. I will send him an email on Monday and ask if we can get this addressed. I will however state that the volume differential on these aids is significantly less than the old ones. These are far better setup.

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Watching TV review

I have only done a limited amount of watching tv (without streamers) and only tested one program so far with all 3 aids. What I found to be of interest was that there was not a large difference between the 3 aids for watching tv, it was far more subtle.

Old Oticon - I had to have the volume slightly louder to hear dialogue as clearly.
New Oticon - I found that I could have the tv volume the lowest wearing these aids and still be able to hear the dialogue clearly. It was louder and the clarity was the most clear with the Oticons.
Widex - I would say that I had to have the volume similar to my old Oticons and I also felt that the dialogue with certain words was slightly more diffuse (not muddy), but just lacked that clarity that I felt that I was getting with the new Oticons.

In all honesty, I was actually surprised by how little difference there was between the 3 aids for watching tv, the differences were quite subtle. Based on the program I was watching, I could easily recommend all 3. I am going to try another program, which I know that I stopped watching (on my old aids) because I found the dialogue too unclear). Maybe that will be a better test? While the new Oticon Intent were the best out of the 3, the differences were quite frankly marginal for me to be honest.

Charging the Oticons and Widex

Oticon Intent - the charger is more solid and doesn’t feel like it might tip over. I also like the fact that the charger lights the actual aids themselves with orange for charging and green for charged. In addition, I do appreciate the fact that when I take the aids out of the charger and put them into my ears, it’s silent to insert into my ear and I only get that lovely startup tune at first. Which is similar to my old aids which have replaceable batteries.

Widex Allure Charger - this was a bit of a disappointment, primarily because when you take the aid out of the charger and insert into your ear, I get an annoying screaming (feedback noise) for the right aid as I put it in. Unless I am doing something wrong, the Widex don’t have a nice little startup tune which is initially silent as you put the aids in. There is nothing more off putting than the screaming feedback noise of an aid as you insert it into the ear. That alone, has really put me off the Widex Charger. In addition, the Widex Charger doesn’t feel as solid and almost looks like it will tip over. In addition, the aids themselves don’t have any lights for charging/charged. The lights are only on the charger itself and it’s not as intuitive as the Oticon orange/green coding system.

So for me, the Oticon charger wins hands down every time!

I will try and remember to check battery usage at the end of the day, but a couple of hours before I took my Oticon’s out yesterday, they still had about 80% charge. So, 5 days lifespan? I used to get about 7 days out of my old aids, although I did not always wear them - especially when working on the computer. So, possibly is same.

Oticon App

I have to use the new Oticon Companion App. This is dog slow to load on my old phone compared to the old Oticon app. I would say it’s at least 30 seconds before I can actually do anything in the app. I am getting a new phone which will presumably be optimised for the new app.

One thing that I have noticed that is annoying about the new Oticon app and that is when I close the app, it doesn’t actually shut down the app, so when I turn off the bluetooth (to conserve phone battery), I get a bluetooth notification that will not go away until I force close the new Oticon app. With the old app, I could dismiss the bluetooth notification and the old app would presumably sleep. Irritating, but not the end of the world.

How do I feel about the new Oticons so far

So far, I am enjoying them. They are much better configured than the old Oticons. They are not as annoyingly loud for street crossing beeping and other treble sounds like that, the volume mismatch is overall very much reduced, I think I can hear people more clearly from a distance etc (I no longer feel like I need to bump up the volume by 1 on left aid, like I used to on old oticon aids) and I certainly can watch tv at a slightly lower volume (not massive difference though). My biggest annoyance is really the sound of my keyboard with the new Oticon. Of the three aids, the new Oticon have the most annoying sound for the keyboard. My old Oticon aids sounds the best - being more balanced with the Widex sounded more clunky and wooden for the keyboard - but also with the Widex the keyboard actually sounds louder as well. I might use comfort mode for the new Oticon if I keep them, because the keyboard sound is so annoying.

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Update on the Oticon Intent

I went into the audio and he adjusted 3 settings to address volume imbalance, some sounds being too loud and things like keyboard sounding really annoying.

He had previously phoned Oticon and determined that for some reason the software was detecting the vent sizes incorrectly. According to Oticon both aids actually have a vent size of 0.8mm!

He changed the software for the correct vent size and changed max mpo for higher frequencies to address volume imbalance and too loud sounds etc.

This addressed all my issues with volume imbalance (it’s not 100% perfect but as close as I will ever get), some high frequencies being too loud and the keyboard sounds a lot nicer!

Unfortunately, I am not hearing speech as well now as I was before the change! This is obviously about tweaking the settings for my specific hearing and as such is not relevant to the review of Oticon Intent. But I just wanted to highlight that all the issues that I was having with the aid, was solved with software changes - it just needs to be further tweaked to get me back to how well I was hearing speech before those changes.

All in all, yes I would recommend the Oticon Intent as it did work well in noisy environments, normal listening environments, watching tv and for dealing with a lot of people in the garden. If I keep the aids, I will review them for music and tv streaming - once we have tweaked them optimally so I can hear as well as I was before the last changes.

Widex Hearing Aids update

I am about to start my trial of Widex. I will come back in a few days, rather than do a day by day review of the Widex. I am keen to see how well balanced the volume is (as it appeared to be well balanced when I wore it initially) and I am keen to see how well it does in music - which is what Widex is renowned for.

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Review of Widex Allure 440

I am giving an early review of Widex because as much as I want to like these hearing aids, I already know that I will be buying the Oticon aids! These are the problems I am experiencing with the Widex aids - which is more down to their sound profile, than an issue with fitting in my opinion.

Everything sounds louder - banging doors, cutlery, you name it and it is more fatiguing than Oticon. The extra loudness comes with no benefits that I can perceive. Closing car doors is so loud, it’s like someone is slamming the doors with all the force of creation behind it. Far too loud.

Speech difficulty in noise - It feels like I can hear everything around me, except the person standing next to me!

Strange dampening of sound - This is really annoying. I don’t know if this is as result of background noise suppression, microphone re-direction or what. I don’t have this issue with Oticon. I don’t like it, even my own voice as I am speaking seems to change in volume intermittently. It’s really annoying. Apparently a widely reported issue with Widex.

Speech clarity lacking - Compared to the Oticon, the Widex just don’t cut the mustard. In all environments I am conscious of the feeling that I can hear (volume wise) but I can’t fully understand what people are saying. The lack of treble that you get with the Oticon means Widex speech sounds almost, but not quite muddy - more indistinct is the best way I can describe it. For my hearing loss, Oticon is much better. I am just not understanding what people are saying with Widex as well as I can with Oticon.

Warbling in right ear - Apparently Widex are renowned for this problem. I believe it’s the feedback manager engaging and dis-engaging as it only seems to occur in certain environments like shopping mall.

Widex Charger and putting hearing aids in - I have spoken to my audio and it appears that Widex defaults to 2 seconds off, then startup tune and then it’s on. Unlike Oticon, which default to 6 seconds. He can’t change it, because they have not made the setting available to him yet in their new cloud system. 2 seconds is far too short, so this really puts me off the Allure as I usually get feedback as I am putting the right aid in.

Wind noise - I found the widex wind noise more loud than with Oticon.

In short, I have come to the conclusion that Widex suffers from the all the very same problems that I used to have with my very old Resound hearing aids that I was never happy with, when I wore them a decade ago. Everything was too loud and was in the end of the day fatiguing, still couldn’t hear properly despite this, had issues with feedback and also had this irritating dampening of sound as the aids switched between programs or suppression. The Widex are a lot better than my old Resound, but I would say, that the problems I had with the Resound are essentially the very same problems with the Widex - just not as bad as the Resound was.

What I did like about the Widex

Charger Light - not so bright in the bedroom. The Oticon charging lights could probably power a space station on Mars they are so bright!

Volume Differential between ears - Out of the box, Widex and Resound never had any issues with volume differential between ears. Oticon (both my old and my new ones) have always needed major adjustment to get this right. Having said that, now that I am more aware of what is causing the imbalance and I have an audiologist that is far better than my old one, I am very confident that this issue can finally be addressed as it is just a case of software configuration. My belief is that I need to fractionally lower the high frequencies in the right ear (they have been lowered too much atm) and increase the high frequencies in the left ear. This should finally address the feeling like the right aid is switched on and the left one is switched off.

Widex App - they have a very neat feature where you can adjust for the following - Less sharp, less echo, more speech and more clarity.
Less sharp reduces treble
Less echo reduces bass
more clarity increases both mid and high frequencies
more speech increased just mid frequencies
It is not clear when to use more speech versus more clarity as they are the same thing I would have thought.

Natural Sound - Widex does do much better than Oticon for natural sounds. Clapping hands and many other background sounds do seem more natural to me. Unfortunately this natural sound philosophy is also what makes speech clarity in most environments harder to understand. Widex do have natural sound, but I am willing to sacrifice this for speech clarity.

Conclusion

For my hearing loss, Oticon wins hands down as for me the biggest priority is clarity of speech in all environments. Does Oticon have negative points? Yes - things like my keyboard and a lot of other general sounds don’t sound natural and can be a bit irritating at first, but I will sacrifice that for speech clarity in all environments. In addition, Oticon doesn’t really have any issues (that can’t be resolved) with software configuration as the problem with Widex is more the sound profile and philosophy.

I did not test streaming - as I don’t have access to Widex streamer and just never got around to streaming with new Oticon - however my old Oticon streams beautifully with tv and I see no reason why the new ones would not.

I did not test music - because speech clarity is my first priority and unfortunately Widex did not make the cut for clarity of speech. I will live with however Music sounds on Oticon because it delivers my prime requirement particularly in restaurants and other noisy places - Oticon delivers on clarity.

Sorry, Widex - I really wanted to like you, but Oticon is the only hearing aid for me!

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I have renamed the title of this post to better reflect what is being trialed and reviewed as I think the original title was unclear.

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