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Phillips 9040 and bluetooth and having the phone in my pocket

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I have the Phillips 9040 from Costco. When the iPhone 13 Pro is in my pocket and I am walking around, I get mini dropouts and distortion which doesn’t happen if I have the phone in a shirt pocket. This is with phone calls and streaming music. It seems like the bluetooth signal is not strong enough or something. I had hearing aid compatibility turned on and am now trying with it off. Anyone else seen this and is there a solution?

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I have the Jabra Pro 10 and have the same issues. It seems to happen more often when I am outside and sit down or bend over. I guess my body is getting between the phone and my hearing aids. Sorry but I haven’t found a solution for this other than taking my phone out of my pocket when I’m in a situation where this is likely to happen.

I’ve had the Phillips 9040 and now have the Jabra hearing aids. Both had/have the same problem. This problem occurred while using an iPhone 12 and 14. Without getting into the nitty gritty of the problem it’s without a question an issue of the hearing aids. It happens with any type of blue tooth streaming. Your phone can stream perfectly to a cheap $15 headset but not to an expensive . The HAs companies are trying to minimize the battery drain at the cost of poor streaming. To me this is a major issue that needs to be addressed. My 9040s were so bad at streaming they even had problems while watching a video where the phone was in my hand 2 feet from my HAs. I returned 2 sets of 9040s to Costco for this and other problems. Personally for me I prefer the Jobras but it’s personal subjective thing and they both suck when it comes to streaming.

@bob.sevcik said:

Without getting into the nitty gritty of the problem it’s without a question an issue of the hearing aids

Not exactly the fault of the , but the fault of LE.
iPhones use MFI, and android uses , and those low energy signals are used to conserve battery power.
Bluetooth itself is a very low energy signal to begin with, and outdoors with no surfaces to reflect the signal, it goes to the ethers so your HAs have drop outs, and disconnects…
Nature of the beast.
The latest HAs and android phones are using the latest standard , which is expected to revolutionize the comms between smartphones/p.c/tablets/earbuds/and Hearing Aids!
iPhone has not jumped on the bandwagon, yet, but Pixel & Samsung have.
I don’t have costco aids, but the soon to be released Philips 9050, and I believe the Jabra Enhanced have LE Audio.

I don’t use Bluetooth much, but the 9040 seems so to work OK with my Pixel 6a.

I wonder if this is an issue with the iPhone and the hearing aids. Perhaps you can find someone who has a Pixel phone you can borrow for a few minutes to see if the issue is still there.

In reply to @flashb1024

Totally agree! I had the exact same problem with MFI. Now with I fortunately no longer have that problem. I now use the Sony xperia 1 vi together with the Oticon Intent, which work excellently together with BT LE Audio. Another advantage is that Sony is already further ahead with BT LE audio because their own Sony WF-1000XM5 also supports LE audio.

What are your settings on the iphone? There’s at least one setting (‘Hearing Aid Compatibility’?) that generally should be turned off. If you’ve got it turned on, try using your aids and phone with it turned off. I guess that means you should experiment with it turned on if it’s off.

Yes I turned if off and things seem to be much better. I walked around in the house today streaming music and it sounded fine. So maybe that hearing aid compatibility on setting is part of the problem.

I have 9040s, but use an Android device. I don’t have the issue. But, I need to hold the phone close to my mouth to make phone calls. Do I recall correctly that iphone users don’t need to do that? (I can hear the sender with the phone in my pocket, but my voice isn’t transmitted through the , so I need to use the phone mic for voice.)

9040 mic and speaker working just fine for me. Maybe Android has a separate setting for mic.

In reply to @ThomF

@ThomF said:

But, I need to hold the phone close to my mouth to make phone calls. Do I recall correctly that iphone users don’t need to do that?

That is the difference between iPhone MFI, and android .
ASHA is one way (receive only) MFI is duplex (receive and transmit).
Most iphone users still use the phone’s mic because the mics are pretty bad at transmitting.

The best solution if you require hands free is using the phone clip accessory.

@flashb1024 said:

That is the difference between iPhone MFI, and android ASHA.
ASHA is one way (receive only) MFI is duplex (receive and transmit).
Most iphone users still use the phone’s mic because the HA mics are pretty bad at transmitting.

Wow that makes streaming phone calls pretty useless on an Android phone. I had no idea. And the quality of the phone call via the hearing aid and an iPhone is just fine.

@Nate_G said:

Wow that makes streaming phone calls pretty useless on an Android phone. I had no idea.

That issue will soon be moot, as the new standard is being deployed by the newest android phones, and Hearing aids. is part of the platform, and apple hasn’t announced their timeline to implement LE Audio into their “Walled Garden” as of yet, so android may come out ahead LOL!

Same exact problem with Phillips 9040 and iPhone 11. When I take a walk and try to listen to music with phone in my pocket, sound cuts in and out. This was not a problem with my prior Oticon OPN and iPhone 11 or prior iPhone 7.

I have the KS 10’s that use classic bluetooth and I have dropouts when streaming with the iphone in my pants front pocket, this also happens with my New Rexton Reach aids. Seems bluetooth has a problems passing through body parts. I don’t have any issues if I carry the phone or put it down on a surface and walk around within 20 feet.

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