Oticon Announces Oticon Intent™, the World’s First Hearing Aid with User-Intent Sensors

@seabeast said:

(ii) to make use of only the equipment already available in a typical clinic (head-
phones/insert earphones and response button)

The parenthetical includes only the input accessories, not the audiometer itself. Some current model audiometers are upgradeable for ACT, but there are many (most?) in the field that are not current models.

@brec said:

Hey! How did you get the -4 to 16 scale representation? My Genie 2 just updated this morning, and this is all I see:

You just have to select it and enter in any arbitrary value like 5.2 for example, and it’ll show up. And you can edit it to any number within 1 decimal point of accuracy.

I entered a value, successively 12.4, 5.2, 12, but no joy.

…and then I clicked the “?” icon at the top right, and based on that I clicked the “Save” button at the lower right, and then… joy!

@Neville said:

Annoyingly, I can’t see why the ACT couldn’t have been made to be compatible with all old devices, like many other clinical tests are. Sure the old devices may not have automatic scoring options, but if they had the audio you could just do it with a score sheet.

Or maybe instead of requiring it to be loaded on and work with an existing and compatible audiometer, they could have just designed it as a stand-alone box that does nothing but ACT testing and measurement. Basically a stripped down version of a full blown audiometer that can be purchased for cheap as a stand-alone. And the licensing cost is built into the price of this stand-alone device.

@anon33641277 said:

But the point of what I’m saying is that ACT has little application to device settings. It would be good if the noise reduction was set exactly to the value of the measured threshold. But here it is divided into 4 levels and uses standard hearing aid settings.

I originally thought like you that ACT data would probably just drive the parameters inside of the MoreSound Intelligence window, like Neural Noise Suppression max values (for Easy and Difficult), and maybe help select the best combination of the Environment Classifier in terms of which of the 5 environments would be grouped into Easy and which grouped into Difficult.

But I heard from a curious user (a savvy DIY user) who tried to feed Genie 2 two different ACT values, one being -4 (the lowest value meaning very little help needed with Contrast Loss Severity), and the other being 16 (the highest value meaning the most help is needed with Contrast Loss Severity). What they reported back is that they see the gain curves (found in Fine Tuning) show different numbers for those 2 cases as well.

This is significant because apparently the ACT data is not just only driving the noise-related parameters’ settings in MoreSound Intelligence, but the ACT data seems to be driving what the gain data on the gain curves should look like as well.

@Volusiano Really good in-put
Thank you and much appreciated.

I don’t think I’d pay more than $200 for it. Maybe a bit more if I had a higher population of non English speakers. But I have other tools to serve the same function.

Since most DIYer will have 2024.1 Genie updated and have access to ACT right now.

Has anyone tried ACT yet? Whether it’s generating random numbers and trying them out, or actual ACT scores. I’m curious to know if there’s any difference.

I still good without ACT. Just want to hear from you guys.

The first screenshot below is what I get if I set ACT to -4 (the smallest value → need the least help). The second screenshot below is what I get if I set ACT to 16 (the highest value → need the most help).

Interestingly, Easy Neural Noise Suppression is only set to 2 (not 4 or 6 dB) even when I need the most help. And Difficult NNS is only set to 10 for me even when I need the most help. It still doesn’t think that I need 12 dB max suppression. I guess my audiogram must have also been taken into consideration because it’s not straightforward mapping like 6 dB for Normal Contrast Loss and 8 dB for Mild Contrast Loss and 10 dB for Moderate Contrast Loss and 12 dB for Severe Contrast Loss.

On the other hand, with ACT of -4 for the least help needed, I still have 8 dB NNS (but not 6) for Difficult environment.

So it’s very apparent that it’s not simple and straightforward mapping of the 4 Contrast Loss groupings into the corresponding 4 Neural Noise Suppression values. Apparently your audiogram probably is also taken into consideration as well.

The Environmental Classifier still say that Complex and Very Complex environments are Difficult environments for me, even if my ACT value of -4 indicates that I need the least help.

Also as reported earlier, another DIY person also notice the gain values changing and are different for the 2 extreme -4 and 16 ACT values. So apparently ACT values drive the gain curves as well.

This is where I’ve been playing with the Moresound settings for years. It’s the Oticon SW guys quizzing linked copies of Genie or screening returns to see which settings are being adjusted/tuned by audiologists and which aren’t.
They probably identified fairly early on that people weren’t adjusting the Moresound tuning: implementation of ACT has followed.
I’d go one further, I’d suggest that the reason people aren’t tweaking it is because the page/effect on the output is badly expressed and unnecessarily wordy. Call it something simpler, use easier terms, make the direction of adjustment more obvious.

I might be wrong, but it reads like a design that’s been put together by engineers whose first language isn’t English, and it doesn’t make explicitly clear what the aids are going to do.

Edit: Also I sit with the PC screen visible to the client on my right. Not across a desk, the client needs to look at this while you make changes so they understand how/where the aid is working harder and where they might struggle more anyway.

ACT is compatible with Real and above

Of course, planned obsolescence is a thing. Oh, sorry, sometimes my cynicism gets the best of me

@anon33641277 said:

ACT is compatible with Real and above

That’s quite peculiar, even though Real and More use the same platform, just that Real has the letter “R” appended to it. Technically More should be compatible. If they allowed it via firmware update or something.

@e1405 said:

Of course, planned obsolescence is a thing. Oh, sorry, sometimes my cynicism gets the best of me

Don’t worry, you won’t miss anything. If you are DIY and keep adjusting MoreSoundIntelligence feature to suits your hearing loss profile.

I have access to ACT but I don’t use it now because I am good with current setup. Just curious to see what it will benefits me.