I upgraded from my 5 year old pair of Oticon OPN 1’s to a the Real 1’s about 6 weeks ago. The challenges / annoyances I’ve been experiencing with the Reals were never an issue with the OPN 1 set I used.
First I will state that my word understanding has improved significantly with the Reals. That is what I am most happy about.
The challenges have been what I would describe as a cross between warbling sound / almost doppler effect when they process live - mostly female speech (sometimes male). It seems (in my thought process and not knowing a lot about the settings that the Aud can perform) that the ’s are processing and then reassembling the words, but just not fast enough to make this very noticeable and annoying. This does not happen on phone calls that I stream to them from an iphone. The other problem is an increase of feedback, especially when driving and close to the window on the car if I turn my head. I never had feedback with the OPN1 set unless I cupped my hand over either ear.
I spoke to my Aud about this a few weeks ago for my ‘tune-up’ visit. She turned off what I believe was the advanced noise reduction, which may have also included feedback, In her office when testing this seems to have reduced the ‘warbling’ effect… in the real world it’s just not the case.
If anyone has suggestions of what my Aud can try to mitigate the problem I’d appreciate it. She knows I’m a techie and would not mind any research that I gather through this forum.
If this has been discussed before, I apologize as I was not able to locate a discussion on this.
Thanks everyone.
W
You’re ignoring this member’s posts.
WACC10 people in this conversation12 min readJump to latest↓
I think it’s all connected. The better word recognition is likely related to more gain in certain frequencies. The greater gain is likely causing feedback and the warbling is the aid’s attempt to reduce feedback. You might benefit from a more closed fitting (smaller vents in domes or molds) This would reduce feedback. Other option is to reduce gain which sounds like a bad idea.
Thank you - come to think of it my Aud has wanted me to use a for a while now, but I really don’t like them. I’m still on a partially open dome. Perhaps I’ll try the others.
If you’re a techie, I suggest that you go on the Oticon website and download the technical papers for the OPN and More and Real to read up on them. You should also download the Genie 2 software to learn more about the parameters your set for you. You don’t have to spend money to buy the NoahLink Wireless interface to become , just the free software download alone will let you learn a lot about the programming features/parameters/options so you can have a more intelligent discussion with your HCP next time you visit her. There’s a DIY section in this forum you can explore if you want to learn more about downloading and using the Genie 2 software.
The OPN has a traditional feedback manager. The OPN S, More and Real have the new feedback manager called the Optimizer. It’s a preventive type feedback manager where it would insert a series of quick pulses to stave off any potential energy build-up that can lead to feedback. Many people refer to what they hear from those pulses “warbling” or “fluttering”. It’s not to be confused with the fluttering you may hear on pure tone sounds in the OPN due to the 10 Hz shift in its traditional/older feedback manager as 1 of the 3 feedback strategies (the other 2 being phase change and gain reduction).
You can have your HCP change the Feedback Manager setting in your Real to Low to see if it’d help. If still not helpful, turn it to OFF. If OFF gets rid of it (proving that it’s the culprit), and you now end up with feedback issues (because you just turn OFF the new Feedback Manager), then you can have your audi enable the old Feedback Shield feature (it’s still there available for use if you want) by running the Feedback Analyzer and enable it next time you’re in the office.
I don’t think your HCP should prematurely turn off the noise reduction feature for you just yet. That’s an entirely different thing, and she should only try 1 thing at a time. Maybe she only turned off (or down) the Neural Noise Reduction setting and didn’t even touch the Feedback Manager setting, which would explain why you couldn’t tell if it works in her office until you came out to the real world and learned that it didn’t help. I would leave the Neural Noise Reduction alone and try to adjust the Feedback Manager setting first.
Regarding the other problem with increasing feedback in your car which you never had before with the OPN, that’s most likely because you had the traditional Feedback Shield enabled in your OPN, but it’s not enabled in the Real because the Optimizer Feedback Manager is supposed to replace it, which is a likely source of your warbling. Like I said above, if turning the new Optimizer Feedback Manager to Low removes the warbling, then you’re all set. If not helpful, but turning it OFF altogether helps remove the warbling, then just fall back on the traditional Feedback Shield and have your HCP run the Feedback Analyzer and enable it next time you’re in her office. That’ll put you back squarely just like how you had the feedback setup in your OPN before, using the traditional Feedback Shield instead of the Optimizer. Note that you can also have BOTH of them on, they’re not mutually exclusive. Meaning if LOW on the Optimizer gets rid of the warbling for the most part, but you still experience feedback in your car, then turn on the Feedback Shield as well, and operate both Feedback features in parallel.
By the way, with your kind of hearing loss, you can probably stick with a partially open dome (like the Bass dome with a single or double vent) and manage your feedback issues with the 2 feedback features available on the Real. I don’t think going to (like a power dome or custom mold) is a must for your type of hearing loss as long as the 2 feedback features can help you manage feedback OK.
While it’s true that Oticon no longer makes the Genie 2 software available to download freely on their website unless you’re a registered provider, there are other ways to obtain it. If you go to the section and browse around the threads there on Oticon software download, you’ll see that there are other members beside PVC who have a copy of the Genie 2 software who would be nice enough to share with you if you ask nicely. Plenty of forum members have obtained the Genie 2 software this way already… Once you have a copy of Genie 2 installed, future updates are readily accessible automatically via the Genie 2 Updater tool from your own installation so you don’t need to worry about obtaining a new copy from somebody else every time a new version of Genie 2 is released.
Although PVC was banned on this forum, he’s now just active in a different forum anyway. So you can always reach out to him in that other forum if you want to.
What a great post @Volusiano! It cleared up my confusion on feedback options for Oticon Real. You should collect your Genie 2 posts and consolidate them into a manual.
Big John
My take is a bit different on one point. Having the Noahlink Wireless is necessary, to me at least. How else do you get your current settings into Genie2 so you can see how your current hardware is configured. You may ask your Audiologist/Fitter to export you a copy but will they? For around $100.00 USD, you can get the real information directly from the aids. I see it as a drop in the bucket compared to the overall expense of the aids et.al. I don’t advocate people start poking around and changing their settings unless they REALLY know what they are doing but knowing what is available is essential to getting the most out of your devices. That starts with knowing how your devices are programmed when you receive them. It’s unfortunate that the mfgrs cloister their software but I believe it could save some victims of the “Dunning Kreuger Effect” from damaging themselves or the hardware. After all, almost anything can be found online if you dig far enough.
I always wanted to get a Noahlink unit so I could at least see the programming. I agree it is a drop in the bucket in relationship to the cost of the ’s. Thanks for the suggestion. Now if I could only find it for $100.00. Seems to be around $150 or so. Thank you!
GN Resound proprietary AirLink 2 is the same hardware as the NoahLink Wireless but with the firmware installed for use with GN Resound hearing aids. One time, there was a seller on eBay who was selling a bunch of them for only around $40-$50 to clear them out. Many folks bought them for cheap from this source then they installed the NoahLink Wireless firmware on it to convert it into the NoahLink Wireless. Anyway, they no longer have any available on eBay, but that was probably the cheapest option I’d ever seen.
By the way, the word on the street is that the NoahLink Wireless version 2 is supposed to hit the shelves some time this year. It should be backward compatible with all NoahLink Wireless version 1 devices, but it may have future support for future devices that the NoahLink Wireless version 1 won’t be able to support. So if you’re not in a hurry, I’d suggest waiting a little bit longer for the version 2 instead.
My take is a bit different on one point. Having the Noahlink Wireless is necessary, to me at least. How else do you get your current settings into Genie2 so you can see how your current hardware is configured. You may ask your Audiologist/Fitter to export you a copy but will they? For around $100.00 USD, you can get the real information directly from the aids. I see it as a drop in the bucket compared to the overall expense of the aids et.al.
I personally agree with this, that if you’re inclined, then why go only half way with just the software download when for another $150, you can connect to your hearing aids and make changes for real?
But, not everyone is DIY inclined and can’t be sure if they’d be able to understand enough about the Genie 2 settings and options. So just having the software downloaded and installed to play around with it in simulation mode only would help let them learn to find out for themselves if the DIY route is really suitable for them or not. If they find that they can handle Genie 2, then the next natural step is to buy the NoahLink Wireless. But if they feel that they don’t understand Genie 2 well enough despite an earnest effort to read through the Genie online help page to learn more about it, then at least they’re not out $150 for the NoahLink Wireless, but at least they know they tried to test out the water a little bit in earnest already.
Understood. is not for everyone and especially not for “tinkerers” without a reasonable understanding of the software and the mechanics of hearing and intelligibility in general. For a cursory look at the software and what it does and what adjustments are available, I agree an interface wouldn’t be helpful. I personally like seeing something I can relate to directly, like my own curve and settings. If a will provide an exported data file, you have it covered. My earlier practioners wouldn’t provide one, just pure tone audiometric print-outs so I went the long way around. When I compared my programs pre and post , ISTS and live voice testing, it helped me better understand what the changes were and how they helped my intelligibility scores. I have long term background as an audio technician so my curiosity is more focused than many.
If a HCP will provide an exported data file, you have it covered. My earlier practioners wouldn’t provide one, just pure tone audiometric print-outs so I went the long way around.
Definitely would be helpful if the would be willing to share the Genie 2 data from your own session with you. This way you can see exactly what all your parameters look like as existing on your hearing aids.
But let’s say if your HCP won’t share that with you, you can still just input your in the Genie 2 Client profile and run a simulation without the NoahLink Wireless to let Genie 2 prescribe a simulated gain curve for your hearing aid. It will not look exactly as the post one you may get from your HCP, but it’s close enough, and at that stage, it’s not about the accuracy anyway, but it’s about the learning of all the parameters that you can adjust for your hearing aids in Genie 2. So an approximation of a theoretically prescribed gain curve based on your own audiogram is good enough for this purpose.
