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TV Connector for Phonak P90RTs

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Thought I would share a piece of GOOD news!!!
Soooo, I have a Phonak TV Connector downstairs in the Den… works great but was a bit expensive… even from that auction website. I wanted one upstairs to handle the 55" TV that I use as an HDMI-fed computer monitor for my work. BUT, I didn’t want to shell out the $100 to $200 bucks for another one… so I took a chance & bought THIS on Amazon hoping it would pair with my Phonak Audeo P90 RTs… and it DOES!!!
Bluetooth 5.0 Transmitter Receiver with Codec Display, aptX Low Latency Wireless Audio Adapter for TV172
So, as opposed to the expense of the Phonak TV Connector, this with tax and all was like $30, and works flawlessly. Hope this helps someone who would like a TV Connector at a significant savings!!!

19 people in this conversation15 min readJump to latest

I have two Costco TV connectors for my KS-10. Cost $99 and work excellent. One for TV and one for laptop Zoom calls and U TUBE.

That’s a great question… and no… the unit is equipped w/ that “low latency” thing… I’ve noticed no lag at all! I was really wanting to use my hearing aids with my work… we have meetings every day (ALL day) on MS Teams, or Zoom, or Webex… whatever. I was using my phone for the sound for all of these, but this required double-login so I could SEE presentations, etc on the big screen. I finally broke down and bought a microphone for meetings, & was using the big screen for audio, but I would get feedback from the TV sound into the microphone… by bluetoothing the TV sound into my , zero feedback. It’s worked well thus far, but today is my first run with it.

A great practical test for acceptable low latency is:
Turn on your TV and set the Tv speakers to normal volume that others in the room would use to listen normally.
Connect your to the Bluetooth device.
If you don’t hear any echo (e.g. both the stream and the room sound) then you are good!
Any echo demonstrates insufficiently low latency and will become annoying! You may or may not notice lipsync problems though…depends.

@cottemar - can you do this test with your $30 device and report back? If no Echo then this is very interesting.

Hi Hooby… excellent point!!!..just now did this test w/ both broadcast TV and a MS Teams meeting (one of my staff also wears and is cool w/ these little experiments)… NO ECHO that I can note… lips are synced and no lag. I gotta tell you, I’m really pleased with it.

I might add for anyone considering this direction, the instructions for PAIRING were deplorable… in one place it states you should hold the button in for 3 seconds… in another place it states to press the button twice… the latter is what worked.

Will that referenced device hold “pairing” with you P90s between TV viewing sessions? In other words, how often do you need to pair your hearing aids to the Bluetooth connector? Thanks, Clif

Fred’s option was at least $40 more. Which was exactly the point the op was making. A viable solution at a very inexpensive price. So I ask again. What was Fred’s point? Maybe he works for Costco

In reply to @cottemar

Hi Cottemar, I have had a Phonak TV Connect on order, now on back-order, from my audiologist for some time. I eventually want a second Bluetooth transmitter so I may give this one a try. I can always utilize it elsewhere if I have to.

I have digital optical feeding a “sound bar” so I may add a powered digital optical splitter to feed the sound bar and this Bluetooth transmitter; but this will create volume control challenges. The Amazon xmtr does not offer any sort of volume control whereas the Phonak TV Connector or ReSound equivalent does. Anyway, something to think about and experiment with. I prefer digital optical to using a 3.5mm analog feed to cut analog distortion as much as possible.
Thanks for information. c!

Hi biz!
Sorry to hear about the back order… bummer… I had read elsewhere that there was a backlog of the Phonak TV Connectors due to a chip shortage from the manufacturer.
With regard to the volume control… no this unit does not have a volume control… but my experience with my TVs is that the optical digital feed is independent of the TV volume… so I use the to adjust the volume, or the Phonak app… actually if find myself using the app more for that as it also has an adjustment for the TV Connector feed to further filter out background noise… uber handy. Anyway, the point being that for me the optical digital is independent of the TV volume, and even with the brand-name Phonak unit downstairs, I don’t find myself using the volume control capabilities of it, but just use the app.
Incidentally, I will mention here that with regard to the unit’s compatibility with my UNITRON MOXI JUMP HAs, it does NOT pair… I stated yesterday (above) that it did, but it appears it paired with a soundbar downstairs when I was trying the UNITRONs and misinterpreted the pairing as with the HAs. So, no go with my UNITRONs.

This thing looks really nice actually. I think the optical ports really help with latency. I have the Phonak TV connector. Got it for around $70 on ebay which I thought was a good price. Really enjoy it but if it stops working I would definitely give this a try.

In reply to @cottemar

I figure that I could use the Phonak app to control volume if the native volume output from the digital optical source was not overwhelming. My sound bar has its own volume control via a remote. /// With the ReSound Streamer2 I set the volume at mid level on the device and then fine tune it with the app for comfort depending upon the TV program.
For me, digital sound is a magnitude better than sound generated by any mechanical analog speaker. The digital signal goes directly to the hearing aids electronics and not processed through the microphones.

Good question…I’m no expert here…ive only owned this thing 2 days…but what I read in the Amazon Q&A, no…no support of Dolby.

Thanks for the info, I think. I bought one when I saw your first post. Got it from Amazon in one day! Anyway, it refuses to pair with my P90 . Just blinks orange forever. Yes, I had put the HAs in the pairing mode. Strange.

Understood… my personal experience, I found that there was a slow blink and a rapid blink, with the rapid being pairing mode… While nothing was paired oh, it would slow blink… But upon pressing the button twice rapidly, the blink changed to a rapid blink & then paired.

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