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Comparing Widex SmartRic to Philips 9040

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I’ve had my Widex SmartRic for almost 2 weeks. My primary reason for trying them is live guitar playing. I found that I just can’t get the Philips to sound natural enough () and I’ve tried the usual suggestions. My best Philips setting is using the Fit4speech rational and then copying the Universal program (to create a special music program) but remove all noise and feedback control and directionality. The Fit4speed rational produces a very comfortable result for normal use for me unlike the NAL2 which is just too loud and I really hate the sound of my voice with NAL2 (open bass domes with the Philips). My special music program is pretty good but some higher notes still sound distorted and tough to judge some high bends as to the pitch which is a major problem. The Widex SmartRIC on the other hand makes my guitar notes sound very sweet and normal, living up to the Widex rep. I’ve heard about (using tulip domes on the Widex).

The Widex was set up using the Widex rationale. On my drive home from the audi it was way too loud and very noisy on the cement freeway. I could not stand it all and all I heard after 50 mph was bacon frying. I believe I have some issues with damage to the my left ear that also seems to produce this type of bacon frying static at high gains making this worse. But I had to literally almost turn the volume down to nothing in the app to survive my ride home with the Widex. The noise was not as bad at speed on asphalt roads and so I think it’s related to tire noise. I found later that if I set the middle EQ gain down by 4-5 steps the noise was suppressed almost completely. The high and low EQ adjustments did nothing for this noise.

I looked at the Widex settings in Compass GPS later that first evening in frustration. I don’t remember making any changes but seems like I might have done something because when I put them back in they were much quieter and tolerable for me. My Audi says that if you make a change, it happens to the aids in real time regardless of if you actually save a change. Maybe I did make some change in poking around at the setting. I’m thinking I might have lowered the “Adaption” from 4 to 3 which is the only explanation I can come up with. On a return visit the audi made some minor changes adding programs and yet again on the way home I found the gains and noise way too high like everything was reset to the original settings!

I even pulled off the freeway and put the Philips 9040’s in and that bacon frying noise could not be heard with the Philips which are set at 100% of the targe. What a relief. So are the Widex HA very poor at handling this type of noise or maybe it’s just that the gains for the Widex ended up being too high? I can see they are 3-4 higher than the Philips at some frequencies. Or maybe the Philips 9040’s are just better with noise?

I’m very torn right now because I love the Widex for my guitar playing and just can’t get the Philips to match that performance and I doubt the new 9050’s will be any better at that one thing. But the Philips are way more comfortable for daily use and handle noise better. If anything I think I even hear slightly speech better with the Philips too. I don’t want to have to use two sets of hearing aids for different situations but it looks like I’m headed in that direction. I see the audi next week and and I’m going to try to explain this and get him to lower the gains. I can get to a comfortable level thru the app but I have to lower the volume down to 2-3 from a nominal 5. I don’t know what each step is in dB but in the Philips the default step size is 2.5 dB.

I’m not giving up yet because I have not heard my really guitar tone for many years and how you sound drastically affect how you play. But I’m pretty exhausted from trying to figure things out. I initially had Widex vented sleeve domes and they just would not stay in, even with the J hook and going to the largest size. The large Tulips seemed to solve that problem and I thought that was the initial reason they were so noisy and uncomfortable sounding but not so sure now.

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Did you have the sensogram & feedback calibration performed after the tulip domes with correct size/vent etc all put into fitting software. It needs to be a completely clean set up with nothing saved from the previous fitting. I have been aware of the noise you describe when something has been incorrectly entered. If all of this has been done and you still have the same issue and the dispenser hasn’t been able to fix it, they can contact Widex technical support. The closer you keep it to the prescribed setting, usually the better they perform and the easier it is to try and tweak something.

My audi suggested NOT doing this since I was happy with the at that time and he didn’t want to screw that up. But he does intend to do that for me this Tuesday. I think this road noise might be the result of too much gain and maybe NOT doing the sensogram like you said. Overall I find the HA way too loud overall and running at 2-3 volume setting in the app. I did notice that the left HA has a 8-9 larger gain at 2.5 and 3.2 kHz than the right hearing which takes a dip there, from the first I’m guessing. I’m not sure if this is considered mid freq as it relates to the equalizer in the app but the “mid-freq” in the app is where the road noise appears to be located. I started to think that the Philips would have to be my choice for now until I played my guitar again with the Philips and then switched to the Widex…huge difference. The Widex is just about perfect for live guitar playing (Philips just distorted high notes too much) and I have to get the rest of the issues sorted out because I just can’t play with the Philips. I have Compass GPS but not doing and won’t even look at the settings anymore for fear I’ll accidentally reprogram them, lol. Here’s the Insertion gains I have right from the my first “peek”. Will try to get my audi to fix things on Tuesday and maybe lower the gain a bit too.

image

In reply to @fbacher1

I can understand how that arose-it can seem like the sound is okay and so you don’t want to rock the boat but it’s like the tyre pressure being wrong in the car. It always needs recalibrating with a new fit otherwise it’s out of sync. It might sound pretty good in some sound classes then you go into another one ie transport, and something odd happens. Some fitters don’t appreciate the importance of this. It doesn’t take that long to do and can save months of trying to fix something that rerunning the sensogram could have avoided. I don’t know if it’s that causing your issue but great you have it scheduled to do this as it’ll give you optimum start point.

Thanks, yes I agree. Still don’t know if tulips are optimal but they mostly stay in at least. I might consider some sort of custom if it was vented enough for my better low freq hearinging. I just can’t turn away from how amazingly good a musical instrument (guitar) sounds to me. I didn’t want to believe the Widex hype but there is something there that is very real in my opinion. Just don’t know if Widex noise handling is a good as the 9040 Philips seems to be. Different domes, fittments, etc. make this an apples to oranges comparison right now. I’m still hopeful the Widex can work all around for me. They “nail” live music so far.

In reply to @jeffrey

Mostly electric but the acoustic (steel string) is even worse. Seems like anything above an open g string warbles, is pitchy, sounds distorted (in a bad way) and can also sound too thin (can EQ the thinnest out). Bending notes to half or full step is the worse since I need to hear the pitch correctly like others are hearing it. Some things can just sound terrible with the Philips while the Universal program in Widex is spot on for pitch, doesn’t warble or sound the least bit distorted. I thought it was my amp distorting for some reason when it should have have been clean and clear but it was the and lowering the gain to the point where it barely improves the tone can help some but then because it’s so low my muffled hearing affect the sound a lot. The Widex HA have something that just makes music sound a lot better than most if not all HA (have not tried them all so this is only based on my experience and what others have said about Widex).

Do you have a dedicated musicians program on the Philips with feedback control turned completely off and compression removed? My Signia aids also had the warble when I played my nylon string in the Muscian program that came preinstalled. I still had to tweak that program. Afterwards it worked great with no warble or distortion. Your provider can turn off the necessary features with the click of a mouse. Of course those features will still work on other programs.

I resorted to for that exact purpose with the Philips. Of course I started by the usual, all noise, feedback and directionality off. I spent many hours trying different approaches. One DIY musician said start by reducing soft noise by 6-8 db then reduce the compression to 1.3. You can’t just turn compression off and have to adjust each frequency to get what you want. I started with the music program in one version (noise and feedback already off), the general program in another version and the speech in noise in yet another. The latest I tried recently is with the fit4speech rationale rather than the NAL2, copied the universal program which was very comfortable for me in normal use and shut off all noise, feedback and directionality. I keep coming to the same conclusion, I can’t make the Philips sound as sweet as the Widex…and that’s the Widex Universal program with zero tweaking. The Widex music program is actually worse without some major EQ adjustments. I do have the 9040 Philips on loan and own the 9030 version. I have also tried tweaking the 9040 programs in the app as well (can’t do that with my 9030) to no avail.

Try as I might I keep tweaking the Philips because I think in normal use it has better noise control and overall better sounding in normal use (can’t explain that one) and the 9050 should be even better in that regard. But it just doesn’t cut it for live guitar playing so far. I’m open to suggestions but simply turning off features and maybe reducing compression doesn’t seem to get you there and to me that says it’s in the hardware differences “somewhere” unless there is some magical tweaking of specific frequencies that I can’t determine. I did have a Philips program that seemed to sort of work better but it ultimately had very little amplification which is why is was not too bad. I thought it was pretty good until I tried the Widex but right now I’m struggling the widex in normal use, lol. Can’t win and I need two hearing aids at this point but maybe my audi will help on Wednesday.

And I found that even when I to the point where a very low gain program worked for better except for very high freq bends, it sounded very bad when I played with a singer, bass player and another guitarist. I have yet to test out my Widex with other players as they are out of town for the next two weeks.

@fbacher1 said:

You can’t just turn compression off and have to adjust each frequency to get what you want.

Could you elaborate on this? I’ve been doing that for a couple years and managed to make my Oticon hearing aids to sound great for music and my guitars. Have you tried v5 as well? It has less compression and it sounds crisper for music - that’s the one I always use for music. However, Phillips hearing aids let you have programs with only one fitting formula, which could be a problem if you need different formulas for music and general use.

So I have not found a “compression” setting in the hearsuite program. What I had to do is use the fine tuning tab and turn on the compression setting which I can adjust for each of the 16 frequencies displayed to arrive at 1, 1.1, 1.2 or 1.3 compression. After I reduced the soft gain by 6- 8 db then I adjusted the loud gain to get 1.3 across the board. Obviously there are multiple ways to approach this and without really having the equipment to know what harmonic of the string noise is causing the issues it’s tough to arrive at a solution. There may be some magic combination of settings that will work all across the guitar fretboard that I have not tried.

I just looked at my latest version and I did not try to tweak the compress which is high at the lower frequencies so I’ll see what I can do and post that later. Thanks.

Edited

I’d like to add that when I was trialing Phonak’s Lumity L90, I tried all my tricks, but my guitars never sounded good with them. I never tried Widex hearing aids, but perhaps what you’re experiencing now is similar to what I faced when comparing my Oticon More to the Lumity: either an important hardware difference or my brain working better with Oticon.

Another point is that the compression scheme used for speech just kills the tone of my classical and acoustic guitars. I’ve also realized that I can’t handle a program with linear compression due to fatigue, so I have to settle for a compromise between pure/natural tone (no compression) and comfort (some compression).

I now know and understand my hearing loss much better, so it’s easier for me to tweak my music programs. I usually use audio that simulates the equal-loudness curves or the EQ test tool in PEACE (Windows) to fine-tune them. You might still need some time to understand your own hearing loss and needs. It can be frustrating at times, but it’s very rewarding when you get it right. You might end up needing something very different from what the programming software suggests. Below is Genie’s stock MyMusic program for my hearing loss, and then what my actual music program looks like…

MyMusic:

image

My crafted music program:

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Edit:

@fbacher1 said:

I just looked at my latest version and I did not try to tweak the compress which is high at the lower frequencies so I’ll see what I can do and post that later.

When tweaking my music programs, I spend most of my time tweaking the frequencies below 1 kHz, as these are arguably more important for classical and acoustic guitars. You could try the Phillips with 1:1 compression, adjusting the frequencies below 1 kHz to match an external reference, such as the equal-loudness curve. This will help you assess the best sound the Phillips can produce for music. Then, gradually reintroduce some compression to find a balance that provides both comfort and good sound quality.

Read it, done it, didn’t do it, lol. They all talk no noise control, no feedback, no directionality and some even talk about compression but don’t ever give examples of how “turn compression off”. You can’t turn it off with the Philips. There isn’t a “compression check box” or anything like that but you can look at compression ratios and adjust the gains to get compression ratios of 1.0 to 1.1…essentially off. But I did look at the Widex universal program that sounds so good with live music and it definitely doesn’t have low compression everywhere, noise and feedback controls are max and even directionality is turned on. So I’m left with there is that “something else” about Widex that works with music and the Philips just doesn’t have it. Maybe it’s the fast processing but I’m not even using the 0.5 msec Puresound mode, which feeds back too easily for me. But the Widex is faster than others even in the Universal std program. This video about sums it up about Widex being the choice of most musicians. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG9eLwB8rfo6

OK so I played around with compression, now at 1.1. I left the feedback to medium in the Philips but off doesn’t make any difference for music, no feedback either way, open bass domes. I heard notes, mostly higher ones warble or distort. Popped the widex in my ears and the universal program with all the 440 bells and whistles turned on instantly transformed the sound to something clear, bell like and sweet without any adjustment. I adjusted the heck out of the philips and just could not get the distortion to go away until the were almost off. Here are the insertion curves for both programs too.

image

image

I realize the gains and compression ratios are a lot different but I feel like one of a million monkeys trying to write a classic poem or story typing randomly at the computer and it isn’t going to happen, lol. With the Widex it seems like for music I’m where I want to be without any fuss. I just have to get the everyday part of the HA sorted out with my audi. Maybe I’ll end up with a molded custom too if that’s what it takes.

I watched the Widex video–ad and was entirely underwhelmed. I will try Widex when next I get hearing aids. Indeed, many musicians prefer them. But that video explained nothing. Ah well, best wishes!

In reply to @fbacher1

@fbacher1 said:

With the Widex it seems like for music I’m where I want to be without any fuss. I just have to get the everyday part of the HA sorted out with my audi. Maybe I’ll end up with a molded custom too if that’s what it takes.

It seems like a good plan with the Widex! It shouldn’t be hard to adjust it for daily use. Regarding the Phillips, the last thing I could think of is … Did you have it set to max in this program above? I’m not suggesting you should leave MPO to the maximum, just that you could try setting it and testing if this distortion goes away. I think a low MPO could distort/compress some frequencies. Another thing to explore: Oticon hearing aids have a digital feature called ‘clear dynamics’ (high input dynamic range, you can google it) that is a game-changer for music. Since Phillips hearing aids are similar to Oticon’s, I wonder if your model has something similar enabled.

In reply to @jeffrey

No and none of them really do or can explain except maybe to talk about the faster processing being one of the things that makes them sound different. And it’s all subjective and difficult to describe except to say widex doesn’t seem to double, distort, warble or sound tinny to me. The notes are clear and ring bell like when comparing them to the best I can adjust with the Philips. That video just supports the fact that their musicians clients end up being satisfied with the Widex where other hearing aids fall short for most people. I know even Dr Cliff once said that musicians seem for prefer the Widex hearing aids “for some reason” as if it’s a mystery, lol.

In reply to @fbacher1

@fbacher1 said:

Here are the MPO values. They are not shown when Compression ratio is shown. They can be modified manually.

The does not appear to be maxed out (though I might be wrong since your hearing loss is very different from mine). It’s likely that a low MPO might introduce some compression or distortion, but I’m not sure that would be the sole reason for what you’re hearing. Here’s what I get when simulating my hearing loss with the 9040 and “bass dome, double” for acoustics.

image

One more thing: I always run an in-situ audiometry to ensure I am not over- or under-amplifying any frequency. It’s like a poor man’s ;). However, I don’t see such an option within HearSuite, so if you want to rule out that possibility, you’d need to do a proper REM with a .

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