Oticon OPN S 1 vs Unitron Moxi Fit - What am I missing?

I experienced the same when I first got my Oticon’s. After some trips to the audiologist, together we concluded that it was not the volume was too high, it was the gain. As soon as the gain was adjusted things sounded much more “normal.” Not so “twangy.” And I didn’t have to fiddle with the volume all the time; except when my wife is talking, the mute feature is essential.

Thank you! I will discuss this with my audiologist on Monday.

@Volusiano , I just added my audiogram to my profile.

What does this tell you?

Thanks!

@vincenthuard Your hearing is not bad at all. You shouldn’t run into many challenges that a competent audiologist shouldn’t be able to help with one of the big name brand hearing aids. It should just be a matter of getting acclimatized to the hearing aids of your choice and fine tuning it to get you to your sweet spot.

I’m surprised to hear that you’re kind of having feedback issue, if that’s what you really meant. If you actually mean that your own voice doesn’t not sound natural enough, but instead sounding robotic, I think it’s either you’re not getting used to how your own voice really sounds through amplification yet, or maybe there’s too much occlusion that makes your voice sound funny through the occlusion.

I think Signia has their special Own Voice Processing that may help with this, if this turns out to be a big deal for you. Most people get thrown off with how their voice sounds being amplified in the beginning, but then they get used to it after a while and it doesn’t bother them anymore.

I basically use the default program 95% of the times, but I set the noise reduction to the max values And the transition help to the highest value, like in the speech in noise program, without the extra volume gain that the speech in noise program comes with.

The other 5% of the times, I either use the music program, or a program with the DSL Adult rationale so I can hear sharper sounds to help even more with speech if necessary. Except for the music program, all my other programs have maximum noise reduction values. To me, there’s no point in using lower noise reduction values if you’re paying for the max values that come with the OPN 1.

@Volusiano : what is “DSL Adul rationale” ?

A fitting rationale is a “formula” so to speak to decide how compression ratios of gains are applied throughout the frequency range based on your hearing loss to give you the best hearing amplification. Many HA mfgs use their own proprietary fitting rationale that they think will work best for their brand of HAs. But there are also fitting rationales that had been instituted as industry standards to be used for any brand of hearing aids.

Oticon uses their proprietary fitting rational called VAC+ on the OPN line of hearing aids (and probably the previous lines as well). That is what is in your default program, and all the other built-in programs that you choose from their menu.

But, they do offer and make available other industry standard fitting rationales as well, like the NAL-NL1, NAL-Nl2, DSL v5.0 Adult, DSL v5.0 Pediatric.

I find the VAC+ to sound the most natural compared to the other rationales. But the DSL v5.0 Adult rationale and the NAL-NL1 rationale sound a bit brighter. Although this makes it not as natural sounding to me, this brightness seems to help me understand speech better in more rare situations where I find speech clarity challenging even when using the VAC+ more natural sounding Oticon rationale.

So you can opt to have your audi dedicate the remaining 3 programs that the OPN has available to 3 of these standard rationales, just to compare and see if you’d prefer any of them over the VAC+ in the default program or not. This will allow you to do A/B/C/D comparison between the different rationales. Once you settle on your preference, you can keep the ones you like more and remove the ones you don’t care for afterward.

I can confirm…no “feedback”/warbling issue with the Unitron. Only have this with the Oticon.

Making some more comparaison tomorrow.

@Volusiano, received my Noahlink today and connected to my OPN S.

Here’s a screenshot of the feedback analyzer…Would this explain why I’m having issue?

I don’t think your issue is with feedback, is it? If not, looking at the feedback analyzer screen shot is not going to solve your issue. Your hearing loss is fairly mild to moderate at most, so I don’t think you’d have to worry about feedback causing your issue.

The only issue I’ve read that you’ve had so far with the OPN S1 is that the “wow” hype was not there for you as expected, and you also mentioned that you have issue understanding in group discussion in noise, right? Oh yeah, and the robotic sounds once in a while, right?

What did your audiologist recommend to do with your OPN S1 to fix your issues?

Has your audiologist been doing Real Ear Measurement (REM). Unless the hearing aids are adjusted to the target curve using REM they can sound very different. Also, if non standard fitting formulas are being used that can cause a difference too.

Your loss is not that bad, and even with open fittings you should not be having feedback issues.

Hi @Sierra,

Yes, doing REM was the first thing she did.

What do you mean by “non standard fitting formulas” ?

Hi @Volusiano,

I disabled the Feedback Shield on my P2. Only time I notice I create feedback is when I put on my Bose headphone to block the outside world while listening to the TV I just switch to my P1 where the Feedback shield is active and the “beeeppp” sound just stop. After my Monday appiontment I’m gonna switch my P2 to P1 and vice-versa so that by default when I turn them on in the morning the Feedback Shield is disabled.

I didn’t think of switching between the 2 programs during my event. I was doing business development and the thought didn’t occur. I’m going to a noisy restaurant tonight, I will do the experiment

Each manufacturer typically has their own proprietary fitting formula with some variations of it. Rexton for example has a formula called SmartFit, and it can be further set to New User, Experienced, and to Power. If you are trying to compare one hearing aid brand to another and each is using their proprietary formula, the formula even though it is REM adjusted, is unlikely to be the same. If you want to compare two different brands it would be better to ask to have each one set to a industry standard formula like NAL-NL2. Then when each is REM adjusted you will be comparing the hearing aids, not the fitting formula.

On your feedback graph above I am not sure what you are showing. Did you do the actual feedback test, or is it just the computer simulation? I gather you have the NoahLink but I think you need more than that to do the actual feedback test. I recall that signal has to be sent through a speaker like the one used for a REM test. It has to be done with the hearing aids in your ears.