Phonak Rechargeable vs Battery-Operated Aids

@prodigyplace said:

Manufacturers also warn against using them in potentially explosive environments like in hospitals using oxygen. They have not been tested for those situations.

Not really a valid argument given your mobile phone has a much bigger and much more powerful battery.

Jordan

In 4 years I had problems twice. First time was early on after one of those long flights - trains - autos with lots of streaming & I arrived at my destination with dead batteries, bummer. But, I learned to keep my charger handy, do top-up charging, and to travel with a battery pack. Second time was on a similar long trip when I discovered that the battery pack I had at the time didn’t permit the slow trickle charging needed for most HAs. So now I make sure to travel with a good Anker or Aukey 20,000 battery. Lessons learned, problem solved - I hope. I am completely sold on rechargable.

@JordanK said:

lithium rechargeable batteries operate at a higher power level than disposables and this allows for additional features and functionality to be added to the hearing aids.

That’s exactly what I was also thinking. So it may be that as manufacturers add add’l functionality to the aids (heart rate, subject has FALLEN, who knows what-all else) they are simply never going back to a smaller zinc air battery.

@JordanK said:

my understanding is that the lithium rechargeable batteries operate at a higher power level than disposables

Lithium-ion batteries operate at a higher voltage than zinc-air. Power output is a different question, and I don’t know about that. But note that there are higher-powered-than-normal 675 batteries especially for cochlear processors, so zinc-air power output apparently can be raised through design adjustments of some sort.

The accelerometer is also used by a Autosense 5.0 to provide better search understanding while you are walking.

“With Motion Sensor Hearing, the hearing aids can detect when the wearer is moving while having a conversation and will automatically adjust the directional microphones to focus on the direction of speech.”

This is a good example of a useful feature needed for hearing. I have tested this feature while out for a walk and it’s really helpful for talking to someone who is walking beside you.

Tap control is another lithium rechargeable only feature. I don’t use it but others do.

“Control your hearing aid with your finger tip! Thanks to lithium-ion technology and an integrated motion sensor, Lumity makes it possible to steer Bluetooth® features via a double tap on your ear. This function allows you to accept/end calls from your connected iOS or Android smartphone. You can also pause/resume streaming from connected Bluetooth devices and access Bluetooth based voice assistant apps.”

Jordan

@JordanK said:

Tap control is another lithium rechargeable only feature. I don’t use it but others do.

Since their flagship models are all rechargeable now, you could have just as easily stated that as a feature of their flagship models.

So…HA’s need rechargeable batteries in order to run more enhanced features? And going forward, possible new developments are likely to need them too?

so it’s not a case of HA manufacturers conniving to take our money? But rather rechargeables open up possible new improvements in design? Huh.

The truth is, I generally don’t want or use most add on features. mY aids recently added daily step counting. . I already have a dedicated device for that. IIdon’t think I can turn it off from my aids. I’d rather not have it on my aids if it means longer battery life without it. Who knows?

@jeffrey said:

So…HA’s need rechargeable batteries in order to run more enhanced features?

No, not necessarily. The enhanced features we’re talking about use a chip, a solid-state accelerometer, that’s presently available only in a version operating at the voltage supplied by rechargeable batteries. It may be possible to manufacture such a chip for use at zinc-ion battery voltages. That’s my understanding. Someone who’s versed in state-of-the-art circuit design and chip fabrication could give a definitive answer. I’m not aware of any such person posting here.

That’s an assumption about the accelerometers. I’m guessing (but I might be wrong) that the accelerometer function is actually read by the diaphragm of the mic moving under skeletal action.

I note that the mics are now a silicon sandwich (the micro machined Silicon mic was just a project when I was working at Knowles - still too noisy), surface mounted directly to the circuit/chassis of the aid. This means that they can pick up and low pass subtract the ‘bump’ of your steps from the remainder of your signal - especially as it will ‘hit’ both mics simultaneously.

‘Smaller, Better, Faster, ……More, ‘

It’s the same in most forms of development engineering: some features will stick, some won’t. Who’d have thought 25 years ago you ‘needed’ a digital Camera attached to your mobile phone?

@jeffrey said:

So, IF its true that rechargeables make some features possible that aren’t with trad batteries

If I recall correctly, this assumption originated from the fact that the Phonak Paradise rechargeable has some features, all accelerometer-based, that are missing from the Phonak Paradise 13.

From a major integrated circuit manufacturer’s paper on hearing aid technology:

The most power-efficient design runs directly off of a single battery, but a switching regulator can be used to boost the voltage to fit design needs, whether 1.8V or 3.0V. The power dissipation is targeted to be 1mW to 10mW when running off of zinc-air batteries. Hearing aids that use rechargeable Li+ batteries may require a linear or switching regulator to step the battery voltage down if the circuitry cannot run directly from the typical 4.2V, single-cell Li+ battery’s fully charged voltage.

So it may be that the HA’s integrated circuit chip did not have space for both a step-up and a step-down voltage regulator.

Or Phonak didn’t want to include those capabilities in the Paradise 13.