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Phonak Sphere or Oticon Intent?

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In reply to @CaptainTrips

This was through my Kaiser-Permanente center and, I think, a recent graduate Audiologist. When she told me that no further adjustments were possible, I RETURNED the Phonak Spheres. I then tried Oticon Intent but did not like the sound quality. I am now waiting to order Resound Vivia. The Oticon Intent worked very well with an transmitter (also Toslink) and the Resound is also supposed to be auracast compatible. BUT NOT, yet, Phonak.

When I had my spheres set up, I had to get them to match the profiles for Streaming Speech and Streaming Music because music in the soundtrack of movies and shows would obliterate my word recognition. Once both were set up the same, I’ve had no issues.

Edited

I’m hoping that I am happy with the Resound. There is one other option, Widex, that I know nothing about.

3/30/26 - 5 days, so far very happy with the ReSound. AND, they work perfectly with the Avantree Audikast 41 I bought for the rejected Oticon Intent.

@choccybiccy69 said:

just sounds like adaptive directionality…. which is what all hearing aids do??

Not quite, they all have a different way of how to achieve “directionality” as in the way it’s processed, 4D bah bah, maybe some white paper’s to help understand what Oticon is trying to do and convince us they have the “better way”

Life-changing technology for people with hearing loss | Hearing care | Oticon2 Certainly people notice differences between the brands and models being offered, so more a personal preference.

I have both the Oticon Intent 1 and the Phonak I90 Sphere. I really wanted the Oticon to work out. I wore them for 10 months. I wanted MiFi (made for iPhone hearing aids), as I really like that they will read my text messages to me automatically. But I could never get them to do well hearing in noise. I even took my laptop and noahlink into some of the places we frequent and never could do better. And I was able to tweak my OLD Phonak L90’s to do better in noise. The way they zoom in on the person I’m looking at was really good.

But my Phonak Infinio Sphere 90’s are a game changer. They are simply another world for speech in noisy restaurants and bars. They simply are the best I’ve ever worn. I’ve been wearing hearing aids since I was 5 years old, and these are what I’ve been waiting 50 years for.

And why anyone offering advice who ONLY has tried Oticon, telling you they are the best to go with is mis-guided at best.

I purchased my Spheres from Genesis-Hearing-Healthcare on eBay for only $2300. They were super helpful and ordered custom titanium molds for me at $150. (Phonak already has my impression on file). I self program, so I didn’t need the follow-up.

They are totally legit. I initially bought on the eBay listing for protection. Hearing aids were shipped fast from Colorado Springs. Stacy worked with me and answered all of my questions and was very helpful in getting my titanium molds. Even shipped them before asking for payment. Also the hearing aids are USA models with USA warranty. I noticed a lot of eBay sellers are selling out of market hearing aids and the warranty is “only through them”. I confirmed with Phonak these have a US 3 years warranty with loss and damage too.

But it’s only an option if you don’t need lots of follow up care. I self program so it’s fine for me.

user490 - that website has the quality of a junior high school computer project. Did you notice the HOME page is exactly the same as the ABOUT US page? Did you notice there are no professional biographies, no names? Did you notice the MODELS AND PRICES page has no models and no pricing? There is nothing in that website to inspire confidence in that company or risking thousands of dollars on.

cjj777 is correct, you should not trust google. You should also use other means to validate google information. Which I did. I went to the Better Business Bureau and searched for Genesis Hearing Healthcare. There is no such listing in their database.

The BBB did have a listing for Hear-Well Inc. which coincidentally has the same address as Genesis Hearing Healthcare.

I conclude Hear-Well has a secondary sales channel (ebay) selling direct called Genesis Hearing Healthcare. I am curious why Genesis Hearing does not acknowledge Hear-Well ownership/partnership and available resources.

Now, back to the original issue, $2,300 for Phonak Infinio Sphere 90? Less than half price? I just checked ebay. There are multiple sellers in that price range. Yikes. I need to check this out.

It seems they may be avoiding the complexity of MAP restrictions. I could find names connected with the other business but it took some digging. Not every audiology practice has names on the website.

I am presently in the process of deciding between the two. Personally I always enjoyed the Oticon sound, had the OPN1, then the More, and the Real at the moment.

Soundwise, the new receivers seem to make a huge difference in both devices, I think.

For a while I was in favor of the Phonaks, also to try out something new and different. Now, I probably will again take the Intent into consideration.

Both devices are in the champions league when it comes to hearing aids.

Have to make up my mind in the following months because I have the impression my hearing slightly deteriorates and it becomes more difficult to follow especially soft sounds.

I wear open bass domes at the moment, this could also be the reason for my present aids to underperform. I set up the devices personally with Genie.

I have tried almost all domes (except power and one vent domes ) and I have to say , the openbass domes work extremely well for me. I used then with my old Oticons and now with my Widex SmartRIC and the Infinios . The engineering behind them is truly amazing : streaming sounds good, no feedback at high frequencies and comfortable .

Both Oticon and Phonak are great aids — the magic is in the programming . The choice between the two is purely personal in my opinion

John;

I just finished trial of Resound Vivia and they were overall pretty good. But I now have the Phonak Infinio Audio Sphere I90 on order and can’t wait for them to get here. There is a video on you tube with an audiologist who set up a sound test of the top 5 hearing aids for 2026 to see how well there worked in suppressing crowd noise and allowing clarity of speech. The Phonaks were hands down the best. I had my normal hearing wife listen and she completely agreed. Good luck on your journey.

Just to close out this thread, I purchased the Phonak Sphere 90 from Genesis Hearing Healthcare on Ebay. Thank you cjj777 for the suggestion. The purchase was easy, prompt, and professional. At $2,500 the price saved considerable cost over purchasing from a local hearing aid company. I have had one zoom fitting session with Genesis and am quite pleased with the Phonak performance. I have not done any diy custom programming and not felt the need for it. Like cjj777 I recommend using Genesis.

Thank you to everyone on this forum for the help and information. John H

hello to all,

After meeting with my audiologist and trying the intents, I have decided to get the oticon intent model 2 with 105 power receivers. For those who have the intents how is the battery life? Has anyone used the TV adapter or do I get an device instead for use on my PC? How is bluetooth streaming and wireless calling? Any thoughts you have is appreciated. Thanks and God bless.

I haven'twaded through all the replies so apologies if others have already posted this. I have moderately severe hearing loss and after reading all the glowing reviews of the infinio sphere, I swapped my Otocon Real minirite T aids for them a couple of months ago. I struggle to hear in restaurants and social gathering and have found the spheres a bit better but not much better. I have had huge other problems with them though. They cut out for several seconds every time I get a notification on my phone, take a photo, use directions in Google maps or anything else involving Bluetooth. It's very annoying especiallywhen it happens mid-conversation. I and my long suffering audiologist have tried various solutions including turning off haptics and almost all notifications ( causing other problems ) but it's still happening regularly. I have found little discussion about this online but eventually discovered that android and iphones use different ways of accessing Bluetooth and it"s a problem with Android phones. My phone is a Samsung Galaxy S22. Sure enough, when I connected them to my husband's iPhone they didn't do it but they were the same with my daughter's newer folding Samsung. My audiologist contacted Samsung, who suggested a solution that didn't work but admitted it might not work. They suggested that "this is clearly caused by Samsungs software and not by the hearing aids themselves , significantlyrelated to how Bluetooth audio profiles (A2DPHFP) are managed in the latest system software" I think this is disingenuous of Phonak. Android phones have been around for much longer than Infinio Spheres and they should have tested their very expensive product before releasing it. I'm not sure how much this affects other people - my audiologist says she's only had one other customer with the same problem, someone with a pixel phone - but Im posting this to make others aware of it. I've also had a problem with the hearing aids fading towards the end of the day,especially if 'Ive streamed music. I streamed music for 20 mins the other day and couldn't hear anyone when I went out for a meal that evening. I wouldn't advise anyone to have these without back up hearing aids.

Im not sure what to do about this , I have thought about swapping to an iPhone but it would be a huge hassle. My audiologist wonders if someone will produce a fix for this. Im wondering what to do now, and woukd appreciate advice, should I just go back to my old hearing aids or is there anything better?

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