What acoustic guitar sounds like through Signia's new IX hearing aids

I notice a significant difference, but I’m hearing them not only through Signia but also through the Philips HearLink 9040 which I’m currently wearing. Hmmm.

I think that means that your 9040 are doing a good job, same as my L90’s

Try it with out your aids and a good set of headphones .

OK, weighing in here with my Lumity Life aids ON and IN, and BT streaming to my laptop, there is a very distinct difference to the NO HA vs HA ON throughout the video.

I prefer the audio quality with NO HA to HA ON. When the toggle shows Signia HA ON, the guitar is exceedingly twangy, sharp and almost annoyingly narrow frequency to listen to. Like a steel string guitar that’s strung too TIGHT.

With NO HA, I find the guitar sounds soothing, mellow, rich and very pleasant, albeit muted and it lacks crisp finish to each pluck. If I jack up the volume just a notch or two on my laptop it’s not bad, but yes, it’s a bit muddied. Even so, to me, NO HA is preferable to that hard, metallic twang of HA ON even with its additional nuances of guitar string.

Exactly my thoughts! To me, there is a huge difference through regular not great speakers with my normal ears, like completely different instruments/strings, but ON is not the version I like.

So nice to see this kind of video. I was trying to describe my cello with and without aid and now I can reference this (tone wise) except in the opposite direction, which makes sense since I have opposite problem.

I’ve suffered with bad setup for 2 years. My HA’s are Phonak Audeo Paradise P90R’s.
The one unknown in all these comments is “How well are the hearing aids setup?”

My audiologist supplied them; he didn’t know how to set them up. That went on for 2 years in spite of feedback from me.

I taught at a Community College. I explained to students that they should have the knowledge to get reproduceable results when they did experiments. They should also have the skills to provide good reports. Reading through the forum I believe that the audiologist or practitioner is the most important factor using hearing aids.

What I have experienced is that two of my audiologists did not have the skill to do setup over a 10 year period. That’s a fatal flaw.

DaveL

I listened to the clip with and without my hearing aids. In both cases, it just showcases how hearing aids kill the nice, mellow, and warm tone of a nylon-string guitar.

I appreciate videos like this, @AbramBaileyAuD . However, for us folks that strugle with the sound of our instruments, I would very much appreciate an A/B comparison between the stock setup versus the optimized setup for music as well. Then we could compare the “A game” of all these hearing aids…

@DaveL said:

Tomorrow the new practitioner is doing a full hearing test including REM for setup.

BEWARE of recommended REM settings!!! They are only a starting point (if even!) as to how you want your world to sound. I get aids set up with REM every time I buy a new pair. They sound HORRIFIC. I am now resigned to the follow-on app’t to completely re-set all the frequency settings to give me the world as I want to hear it.

You just have to articulate what you like and don’t like about sound coming in.

Geez, you had a rough 2 years. It’s sad that the people closest to us (significant others, family, co-workers) are the ones who actually KNOW what we’re missing. Augh.

The old audiologist who dispensed the HA’s always was pleasant and polite. He always had an explanation for my questions–hindsight–they were excuses because he didn’t know what he was doing.

About 2 weeks before we parted he kindly setup my 10 year old phonaks as backups. I called him and thanked him. And I said I wished that my 2 year old Phonak Paradise P90’s he dispensed sounded as good. Last appointment he said he had anxiety attacks.

If he had the latest version of Target he could have done a quick setup 2 years ago and I would have been able to hear.

My real concern is that the current audiogram used by both shows my hearing has improved about 10 dB. That’s a miracle! In over 20 years of tests my hearing has never improved. I’m really looking forward to seeing what the new audiogram will be.

I apologize for leading this off track.

Perhaps it’s not…listening to music with hearing aids requires better setup. Perhaps my example will help others become better advocates to improve their hearing by demanding better setups. Will AI improve the way our hearing aids are setup for listening and music?

It’s time for me to tune my ukulele and see how it sounds now using my hearing aids with the better setup.

AUGH! I’d start ALLLLLL over with a whole NEW audiogram and speech comprehension test. Clean slate.

If your NEW guy used that OLD audiogram, that could be garbage!

Get a clean start. The new audi seems to know how to set things up. Not everyone can (or should!) be a DIYer. I leave my aid tuning to my audi. That’s her job! If I lived in a remote location (as I did for 17 yrs till moving here), I’d be more incentivized to tweak my aids on my own.

That’s why I asked for new hearing test and setup.

I have a workman’s comp award due to exposure to loud noise at work. I’m very grateful that the new practitioner took me on. I’ve checked. WC will pay for this setup.

@DaveL said:

Target is based on PC’s.

for a couple hundred you can get a used PC and a Noahlink for less than $100 … probably less than than a appointment with the AUD.

Appreciate it. Good advice.