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Costco News: KS10 discontinued

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In reply to @jeffrey

Costco allegedly makes zero dollars on the their car-buying program, and I suppose that could be true of their hearing aids, too, but I would bet not. The staff and equipment cost a lot, and like almost everything electronic, there is a huge markup on hearing aids. But I have heard the KS10s are not up to par, in some cases.

I had Phonak Audeo Paradise P90R’s rechargeable, with Cros for my dead ear. I found that the went dead (ran out of charge) every day about 8PM. In other words it was designed/tested insufficiently. I found that if I used the Cros, the main HA charge lasted 2 hours less. I almost never use Bluetooth. Then, the recharge began to fail. The HA would red-light when I inserted it into the charger - tried MANY times. Once, it was normal when inserted, but was red-lighting in the morning when I opened the recharger case. I contacted (my HA supplier) and have replaced the rechargeable HA with the same model that uses the size 13 battery. No trouble so far.

In reply to @mrblanche

We’re drifting off topic here, but a car dealer told me how much it cost per month to be in the Costco car program, quoting a 4 digit$ number (from memory). It may vary by market, volume, etc., but it isn’t zero.

Doesn’t the KS10 come in a disposable battery version? If so why would that version also be off the market, if in fact it is an issue with the rechargeable KS10 version?

In reply to @don2

Yeah but I can’t see it happening, because one of the biggest drivers for change is environmental, but this brings up the question of, what happens with all those lithium-ion end of life , of course some kind of recycling is already going on, but still it’s something to consider.

Edited

In reply to @GrayGhost

You can’t go thinking like this other wise your stuck with older models for ever, I too am actively avoiding them, but I know that I’ll just have to accept this as a given, rechargeable or hearing, I know which one I need more.

Edited

In reply to @tenkan

Anyone with a few functioning brain cells and a conscience is going to recycle , especially with rechargeable batteries. I don’t see any end-of-life issues, and recycling centers have big and growing demand for the materials that come out of dead electronics.

FWIW, I’m something of an aficionado of electric vehicles, so I’m fairly current with battery tech. What the EV world means when they talk about “solid state” batteries is not the silicon chip type of solid state most people would think. Today’s batteries are made in cylindrical or flat configurations, with layers (electrodes and separators) configured either like lasagna (flat) or jelly rolls (cylindrical). All they mean by “solid state” is eliminating the wet electrode processing in an otherwise old-fashioned battery. It brings benefits, but it’s not the holy grail of batteries.

Real solid state batteries (vapor-deposited materials on silicon or similar substrates) do in fact exist. Development continues. The challenge is to scale them up to big-device size. The good news is that when they start to be produced in commercial numbers, they will likely be available in very small sizes first.

I can’t think of a better application for them than HAs. Multi-day charge, running all the features you want. Even though this is likely a forum with a rather high average age, I’m betting we will see some of these batteries well within our lifetimes.

@ctromley said:

Anyone with a few functioning brain cells and a conscience is going to recycle HAs

Welcome to the forum, unfortunately in the real world it’s not as easy as that, we live in a throw away world and this is why we have such massive issues right now with electronic devices, PC,tv, mobile phones to name a few, environmental responsibility is with the end user and unfortunately most of this is ending up in landfills all over the world. Greenhouse emissions are a real worry from landfills.

@ctromley said:

Real solid state batteries (vapor-deposited materials on silicon or similar substrates) do in fact exist. Development continues.

Absolutely, I can’t wait to see what’s coming, Widex experimented with a type of ENERGY CELL but then they dumped it.

@ctromley said:

I can’t think of a better application for them than HAs. Multi-day charge, running all the features you want

Again I agree, hopefully in my lifetime I’ll see it.

In reply to @mr.smithster

You talked about chargers. A while ago my audi gave me a second charger for my Phonak audeo Paradise P90r’s He explained that they were on back order; wonder if it is a chip shortage?

My gut feel is that there aren’t many differences between the K10’s and the P90’s. I’ve experienced charging issues twice with a P90 hearing aid. I had to read the whole owner’s manual to figure out what to do. ’

Thanks for your posts.
DaveL

Edited

In reply to @DaveL

@DaveL said:

So my take is that they are private label versions of my hearing aids…Phonak Audeo Paradise P90R’s…

I’m getting nervous because I think they should perform the same. Why isn’t anyone saying the same about the P90’s?

  1. The housing is different, 2. Costco Canada isn’t having the same problems.

Thanks Neville.

I’ve left home twice, ’s on and full charge. Got to work (15 minutes) and right hearing aid dead. 0 charge. Put them in the charger. Full charge; reset the hearing aid, and repaired. Worked fine. Each time I’ve had to read the whole darn manual to figure out what to do. Now it’s printed, highlighted and ready for next time. Paradise Audeo P90R’s. One year old.

DaveL

Is there anything to see beyond what we get in the first paragraph and a half (and except for the talks, we already knew) ?? I would have expected there to be “talks” in progress.

WH

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