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Dear Phonak, your Lumity battery isn't good enough

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Grrr. We just arrived at an evening concert $$$
And my Lumity is running down :cry:

In reply to @rsinclair123

@rsinclair123 said:

One thing for sure - adapting to the new aid will be much quicker that adapting to my cochlear implant was.Cheers

Congratulations on this new aid.
is different as you know. For me there wasn’t any hair cells to hear speech with.
Keep us posted on your progress.

In reply to @Dusty

@Dusty said:

Sometimes more time spent writing than it would take to implement one of the many solutions that are offered.

Power outage solutions aren’t the final word on rechargeable vs. traditional aids.

@Dusty said:

What is the power failure scenario where HAs are the only thing requiring a solution?

Some people live in apartments where everything is under the building’s control. Some people live in houses that could benefit from backup, but they don’t have it. That’s probably the majority of house dwellers.

Battery backup is available to anybody with enough money. For less than a $1000 I bought a “solar generator” that will give me enough power to run my refrigerator for at least 8 hrs and if there’s sun i can do that every day indefinitely. These could be used in any situation I can imagine. I even took mine camping for CPAP.

Recently I took a two week trip out of state, and had to decide which hearing aids to carry with me. After thinking it over, I decided to leave my Phonak M90 rechargeable aids home and took the Phonak V70’s along with 2 packages of 312 batteries which take up almost no space in my shirt pocket. The batteries in the V70’s consistently get 6 days of use, and I don’t need to worry about carrying around a bulky recharging system, and looking for power wherever I end up.

Actually with the exception of the ability to stream phone calls to both ears hands off with the M90’s, my V70 aids sound every bit as good, if not better, and 6 days run time on a pair of inexpensive batteries is very satisfactory. I will keep my V70’s going as long as I can even if I have to send them out for repair in the future.

I believe that Phonak works as hard as possible to eliminate any contact with the folks who actually use their products, and due to the resultant isolation, and lack of direct consumer feedback, have very little understanding of our needs and concerns. They operate in their own self created bubble.

@dacuttler said:

I believe that Phonak works as hard as possible to eliminate any contact with the folks who actually use their products, and due to the resultant isolation, and lack of direct consumer feedback, have very little understanding of our needs and concerns. They operate in their own self created bubble.

Etched in stone here … I think a LOT of us agree with that observation. Coming from a high tech marketing background myself, I simply can not fathom how clueless, obstinate and deluded Phonak appears to be in the SINGULAR area of battery operated aids. I would love to be inside that company and truly understand their rationale. If they promote rechargeable aids ONLY because some kind of electronic benefit favors rechargeables at least I could REST with it. But my gut tells me there is some money-oriented reason they no longer want to offer battery aids ACROSS the models! They don’t even have plans for a size 13 battery aid. Just the 312 is being “talked about”, but until the day I see it out there, I won’t believe it.

We are asking for today or tomorrow’s technology in battery aids. Not yester-year’s from 4-5 years ago. I’ve come to accept that there will likely never be a truly “waterproof” aid that can be made in my lifetime, but I somehow find it unbelievable that the technology available today can not accommodate a size 13 battery operated Phonak Lumity Life aid (or something with that level of speech enhancement).

GOOD FOR YOU taking the battery aids on your 2-week trip. I have to take 3 pairs of aids when traveling: my battery Marvels AND 2 pairs of rechargeable Lumity Life aids. In the perfect world, I want the speech clarity of the Life aids, but if things go sideways regarding charging up my aids, I’d have to have the Marvels. I’m deafer than cinderblock. There’s no margin for “ah, whatever!” when I’m traveling.

In reply to @x475aws

@x475aws said:

Some people live in apartments where everything is under the building’s control.

Sure. But most will still have to charge their phone and laptop, or power their PC etc. Related, best not to tolerate PC crashes during brownouts or power blips. So a computer UPS is a great idea for regular times and for outages. Also provides something to plug a phone charger or into. Cheapest model I see in a quick search on Amazon.ca is about $80. Step up to a generator-sized model and now you can run a microwave, hot plate etc. Point is, if one is making any effort at all towards minimum self sufficiency during outages, then the HA charger solution is probably already there.

Personally, I can’t abide rechargeable hearing aids, I dislike them with a passion…In the same breath, I do appreciate some folks love their rechargeable hearing aids, but the truth is, rechargeable aids are totally unsuitable at present, for UP hearing aid users, they aren’t powerful enough, rechargeable ’s are fine for, Mild, Moderate, Moderately Severe, and perhaps some Severe, if they suit your lifestyle? But, with Profound losses, as yet, they don’t cut the mustard… In my experience, a aid is always going to sound far better than any RIC, it will have a richer & fuller sound, so you cannot at present recreate that sound-scope in a RIC aid, for me, a 105db RIC is about as much use are a chocolate fireguard, my is sitting around 130db on the left hearing aid…When I did have RIC’s, I kept blowing 105db receivers, with custom moulds, a real PITA, to have them constantly remade! I had a long chat recently, with a Phonak manager, I related some of our concerns on this site, about a lack of choice between rechargeable & replaceable battery aids, their reply was somewhat reassuring… They stated, that Phonak will always have a replaceable battery version of their aids, simply because they are heavily committed to paediatrics, it is part of their whole ethos, alongside looking out for the Severe/profound… I therefore fully expect a Lumity RIC with 13 batteries sometime next year…I am trialing there Naida Lumity 90 UP BTE, using 675 batteries, I am very impressed with these aids, and into my 3rd week of the trial, with just under 13 days runtime, with moderate streaming, they are stunning aids, with excellent clarity…Cheers Kev :grin:

In reply to @1Bluejay

I should have mentioned that I also carried a cheap pair of Phonak Bolero Q30 aids and a package of #13 batteries as a backup for the bolero V70’s.

Personally I think the rechargeable aids are fine for around the house, or short day trips, but otherwise I am reluctant to rely on them. No matter where you go, there’s always a drugstore nearby selling batteries, and I can purchase Power One 312 batteries off Ebay in 10 card packs very inexpensively.

I do like hearing phone calls thru both ears, and that’s the main reason why I wear the Bolero M90’s. If I had the opportunity to trade them for the same model with the 312 batteries, I wouldn’t think twice.

@dacuttler said:

I do like hearing phone calls thru both ears, and that’s the main reason why I wear the Bolero M90’s. If I had the opportunity to trade them for the same model with the 312 batteries, I wouldn’t think twice.

Not sure what your budget is, but my Phonak Marvels were size 13 battery and streamed beautifully through both ears via Bluetooth on my cell phone as well as the dedicated Acoustic Phone program that I used on ALL other phones that the aids weren’t paired + connected to.

I don’t have a budget, having purchased my Marvel aids as new off Ebay for a ridiculous price, and programmed them myself. Basically I guess I can’t complain. If on the other hand I Had paid retail for them, I would have gone ballistic.

Well then! Use the Marvels to stream phone calls to both ears! You don’t even need the myPhonak app. Just pair + connect them to your phone and VOILA! Beautiful streaming in both ears. My Marvels are 90s, too.

Back to your earlier post, I heartily agree with your observation that batteries are readily available (at least for now!). I’d buy mine at Amazon or Costco. But if the market for batteries dries up thanks to rechargeables … well, I don’t even want to contemplate that for ME.

In reply to @Dusty

@Dusty said:

So a computer UPS is a great idea for regular times and for outages.

I think that’s a good suggestion for someone who has rechargeables and is concerned about power outages. At the same time, I think it’s reasonable for someone opposed to rechargeables to complain about the need to spend money on a UPS, find space for it, and replace its battery as needed, when it’s unnecessary with the traditional batteries they prefer. Even though a UPS might provide other benefits.

Power outages didn’t even enter into my thinking when I decided that I didn’t want rechargeables.

In reply to @x475aws

@x475aws said:

I think it’s reasonable for someone opposed to rechargeables to complain about the need to spend money on a UPS, find space for it, and replace its battery as needed, when it’s unnecessary with the traditional HA batteries they prefer.

But they don’t “need” to buy anything. Just plug into the nearest vehicle. Or for convenience, spring for a $20 portable power bank. If I was hoping to convince the CEO of an international conglomerate to see things my way, I’d leave out the power outage angle entirely. They make their decisions and throw the complaints in the round file. But they’ll throw the padded complaints extra hard.

In reply to @SallyB

How “new” is the new Audeo Lumity Life L90 you refer to? My Lumity Life aids date from Sept/Oct of 2022, and all I get is 17.5 hrs of use a day. Granted, daily battery life is going to be determined not only by one’s POWER needs (of which I’d be at the TOP), but how they typically use the aids for streaming, etc.

In reply to @1Bluejay

@1Bluejay said:

Back to your earlier post, I heartily agree with your observation that batteries are readily available (at least for now!). I’d buy mine at Amazon or Costco. But if the market for batteries dries up thanks to rechargeables … well, I don’t even want to contemplate that for ME.

Bluejay,

There are millions of folks living in countries where spending thousands of dollars for the latest rechargeable hearing aids is totally out of the question, and will continue to make use with the technology they now have, which means the world wide market for batteries will probably be there for many years into the future.

Have no fears.

@dacuttler said:

folks living in countries where spending thousands of dollars for the latest rechargeable hearing aids is totally out of the question, and will continue to make use with the technology they now have

Why couldn’t manufacturers start selling cheap rechargeable aids in those countries?

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