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Do I need a soundbar with my new TV?

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Am looking to get an LG OLED TV. Wondering if the voice separation is good enough to not need a high end sound bar so I can actually hear dialogue and enjoy TV again?
Also, what are you doing to enhance sound when wearing Hearing Aids

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There should be sound settings on the TV settings to do that for you, I have 2 Sony TVs with that type of settings Snd they both or older TV flatscreens.

I have Oticon OPN1 hearing aids and have the TV connect that streams to my hearing aids from the TV.

Screenshot_20191107-190845 There are sound bars with hearing aid technology to help you listen speech from TV.

I have that LG, a super great screen, best video you can get. Audio depends on your ears, it’s not good enough for me. Sound for me has to go through a super sound system with equalizer or direct into via link.

Part of the problem with current TVs is, where is the speaker? Time was, speakers were right there on the front of the TV (I may be dating myself, here) Now they’re inside somewhere and the sound dribbles out thru the top? Bottom? Sides? And then bounces off the floor or the walls on it’s way to your ears. One thing any sound bar will do is it will at least beam the sound more directly towards your ears. Those that have the dialog enhancement function really do help make voices more understandable. I have Zvox soundbars on both TVs and have been quite happy with them. Zvox always seems to have been the leader (or one of the leaders) of developing dialog enhancement technology.

Have an older Vizio. Speakers are in the front.
When I first got the aids TV was hard to hear.
I have gradually gotten used to them and as a result I can understand the TV better but it still depends on what channel and program is on.
I still use the captions to help.
Bought a sound bar to see if that would make a difference. It does.
I can hear the TV without using the captions.
Went to my wife’s cousin’s condo.
New Vizio. Speakers are on the bottom no sounds bar.
Even raising the volume couldn’t understand the TV.
Had to use the captions.

We have an LG OLED TV. There isn’t a better picture. Infinite dynamic range and absolute total blacks unlike LCD TV’s.

We bought a matching LG soundbar for our LG TV. If I disconnect the soundbar the audio, with my ’s, speech is very difficult to understand. With the soundbar the sound, with my HA’s, is full, rich and superb. Get a quality sound bar and compare sound with and without. If it doesn’t make a significant difference, return the sound bar. My bet is that you’ll keep the sound bar.

You might also click on my Avatar and look at my . See if I’m anywhere close to yours.

My wife and I have ReSound Prezas. The best thing we’ve done for TV listening is to get a TV Streamer 2. We can now hear subtleties that were lost with both the TV speakers and our 5.1 sound system.

We’ve only had it for a couple days, but I’m ready to turn off subtitles.

I did a little research on the Zvox 200 sound bar. There are some really bad reviews about reliability, especially with Samsung TV’s.
This sound bar is also highly rated for actually helping with voice clarity.
Not sure what to think now.

In reply to @Raudrive

Only compared to the D/E built into the TV. There was no comparison there. Since I’ve never seen any other manufacturer demonstrate the commitment to the development of the technology that Zvox has, I haven’t bothered comparing elsewhere. Most just seem to include it so they can say “Yes, we have that too.”

I’m curious where you found the bad reviews, and especially WRT Samsung TVs. I can’t imagine why the brand of TV would affect things since its just a simple hookup to the audio out of the TV via either the standard 2 channel phono plugs or most commonly on current sets, fibre-optic.

BTW, the 203 is the model you should look at as that is the current “audiology” version. The 200 is just their standard offering for folks with more or less normal hearing. Take a look at the Zvox website for the rundown. I believe they offer a 30 or 60 day money back guarantee if you’re dissatisfied with the purchase.

I use OPN S 1 hearing aids currently (OPN 1 previously and Siemens pure before that).

My experience is the built-in TV speakers are not very good - possible exception would be a newer large TV with highly rated speakers (rating from an independent source). I used to use a decent quality stereo system with broadcast monitor speakers - that worked much better than the built-in TV audio/speakers. My next step was a Sonos Beam sound bar connected by S/PDIF (Toslink). No real difference compared to the stereo with good speakers for understanding voice using my hearing aids.

My best listening, especially to TV programs or movies with speakers with accents other than US English (west coast), is using a TV Adapter 3 from Oticon to stream directly to the hearing aids with the hearing aid microphones muted. I’ve connected the Toslink from the cable box to the Oticon adapter - I could connect it to the TV as the Oticon adapter has a Toslink output that could go to the Sonos. The hearing aids aren’t great for low frequencies but the streaming to them is much better for voice understanding than anything else I’ve tried.

One possible issue with a streamer is they may introduce a slight delay - you might notice that if you have both the TV/sound bar audio on along with streaming.

I have Phonak Marvel M90 hearing aids. We have a Samsung Smart TV - I simply cannot hear what is being said through the TV speakers (the TV is mounted on the wall). We connected a Bose Solo 5 sound bar - it has a button that can be used to clarify the words. If necessary I use the Phonak app using TV and select more sound if we are both watching together. This works really well for me and I don’t have any trouble hearing movies on Netflix or on general TV programmes.

I have the LG OLED also, and the speakers are pretty good as-is.

However, I also have the Oticon TV Streamer hooked into it, which works extremely well for me. You can balance it with the speakers, so it can either just add some clarity for you, or turn it up and turn down the tv volume so its not as loud for those with you who dont wear hearing aids.

In reply to @Lorjoh

Thanks for getting back to the sound bar question.
Bose makes good stuff.
My hearing is much worse than my wife’s, I typically use the Compilot2 but my wife needs better sound quality out of the TV. The sound bar is a great idea for her and maybe me too.
I will look into the Bose.

My own 2-cents’ worth: as jhbusse has mentioned above, TV speakers are notoriously located in such a position as to make the audio as HORRID as possible - like mayba mad gremlin in the factory has final say where it’s placed?

I absolutely rely on my Phonak TV Streamer to hear any program on TV. I have come to realize that the best sound experience for someone with my level of hearing loss is to use the streamer with ambient sound utterly OFF. That is a setting an audi can do. I’ve tried streaming TV with ambient sound on LOW, but even then, I’d get an annoying echo-effect with the separate speaker we have attached to our media setup and the sound streaming into my aids.

In reply to @biggar

Tx, I was at Best Buy today. They say the speakers are in the back of the set because the set are so thin. I bought the LG 75 inch Nano instead of the 65” OLED. Am toying with adding the - ThinQ 3.1.2-Channel 440W Soundbar System with Wireless Subwoofer and Dolby Atmos - ?

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