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Phonak Audéo Sphere

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Edited

My audiologist reached out yesterday to tell me that the new hearing aids should be in soon and he has set me up to trial them. He also shared some more details. Sounds like the noise reduction is a game changer in noisy environments but it does drain the battery faster. I suspect you will have to use the new AI capability sparingly. I believe the points below are from discussions at the launch so still need to be validated from real world use.

  • The Bluetooth Audio is so much faster and also less likely to lose connection when you walk away. Bigger distances as well.
  • The hearing aid looks like a pregnant regular Infinio. They needed a much larger battery.
  • Sphere still provides 18 hours battery life a day with some streaming.
  • “Sphere speech in loud noise” is part of the auto mode and will auto activate as required. It can be added as a separate program and if activated has a maximum run time of 3 hours and then it automatically switches back to auto mode.
  • You cannot activate it again with the push button or app to ensure the hearing aid doesn’t run out of power. However, if you put it in the charger, put it to sleep and then restart it, it thinks it is another day and will allow you to use the sphere function again. If Sphere is used continuously in this manner the battery lasts quite a bit less.
  • The charging case is really quite small and has a battery pack built in for charging on the go. It allows two charges.
  • He also mentioned that he got to listen to a sound demo through headphones using the Sphere as the pickup point. He felt it was very impressive. It appeared to “really clean the sound envelope and leave speech prominent.”

Jordan

@JordanK said:

Sphere speech in loud noise” if activated has a maximum run time of 3 hours and then it automatically switches back to auto mode.

In the screen shot of Target 10 way way up somewhere in this thread, it appears the 3 hour limit can be selected or deselected by the HAS or DYI person.

Phonak has let us know that the sphere will not be available for some of our 3rd party insurance programs (e.g. WSIB).

Also, pricing on the Sphere 90 versus the 70 is so close that I wonder why anyone would get the 70 and whether it’s not actually being made at all and somehow only exists as a marketting illusion. :laughing:

Interesting. I didn’t get a firm price from my audiologist but they tend to have standardized pricing per level and she thought it would be about $4200/pair for 70 and $6k/pair for 90. From looking at the feature sheet it looks like the only difference is a soft speech program (something like Speech Enhance?) which seems like it would be pretty easy to come up with a work around for 70 level. I guess it’s possible that the 90 noise reduction capability is better but they don’t mention it.

Huh interesting. I also feel like the 70 will be very close to the 90. Speech enhancer boosts soft speech in quite environments and there isn’t really a work around. It’s nice to have, but I’m not sure it’s 2k nice to have? The sphere program at the 90 level offers a wider range to reduce noise, sort of similarly to how oticon throttles their nose reduction by level.

Edited

Dr. Cliff just posted his detailed review on Audéo Sphere. They have upgraded to Bluetooth 5.3 but LE will come later with a firmware update. He also says that the noise reduction program is a battery hog. That being said, it looks like the AI noise reduction in a real world environment is game changing. Autosense 6.0 also has some cool extra features too.

https://youtu.be/ZJ0-aZHwOE4?feature=shared39

Edited

Speaking of batteries, an interesting solution is found in sound processors for cochlear implants. I wear disposable 2x 675s daily, but when they run out in the middle of the day, I simply switch to a larger standard or smaller compact rechargeable battery.

I’m just theorizing, but perhaps this may be a solution for excessive battery usage with .

20240817_171549

Cochlear Nucleus 6 - CP910 (2013) with (from top):

  1. 675s basket
  2. Standard rechargeable battery
  3. Compact rechargeable battery

Phonak Paradise P90-RT (shown for comparison).

20240817_172916

This is connection between sound processor and battery.

Could work for a big . Less for a , especially if one is trying to maintain water resistance.

In reply to @Neville

For Speech Enhancer replacement I was just imagining bumping up 35 speech level, but I’m guessing separate program brings a lot more sophistication.

In reply to @JordanK

LOL at Phonak’s previous generation Lumity being the worst performer in the noise. :joy:
The video also claims that Starkey evolv 2400 is better than Oticon Real 1 in the noise. I own both Starkey evolv AI 2400 and Oticon Real 1 and in my subjective opinion, Real 1 is better in the noise than Starkey evolv AI 2400 because it is easy to separate individual voices with Real 1 than with evolv AI. Maybe Starkey’s programming needs some tweaking. :thinking:

Edited

In reply to @MDB

@MDB said:

Could work for a big BTE. Less for a RIC, especially if one is trying to maintain water resistance.

The newest Nucleus 8 (released in late 2022) has an IP68 rating with a rechargeable battery. With basket with 2x disposables is probably IP54. Protection can be extended with the Aqua+ accessory.

In reply to @Neville

@Neville said:

Speech enhancer boosts soft speech in quite environments and there isn’t really a work around. It’s nice to have, but I’m not sure it’s 2k nice to have?

I was very impressed with Speech Enhancer when I tried the Phonak Lumitys. It made my soft-spoken wife easy to understand even when she was across the room. It was one of the things that inclined me to go with the Lumity over the ReSound Omnias. I agree I wouldn’t have paid an extra $2K just for that option in the Lumitys (but there was no price differential then). The relatively short rechargeable battery life of the Lumitys and the expense of accessories like the Roger On made me back off since I am generally in a quiet, not very demanding sound environment. But since the Spheres sound like a game changer, I may be willing to live with constrained battery life and just keep the charger handy when my insurance for rolls over in early 2026 (Sigh!).

@jim_lewis said:

But since the Spheres sound like a game changer, I may be willing to live with constrained battery life and just keep the charger handy when my insurance for HAs rolls over in early 2026 (Sigh!).

At the rate hearing aid technology is advancing (and in general), the Spheres will likely be outdated by 2026…

Watched Cliffs video, and clearly it a brave move by Phonak to release a compromised . Bulky with low battery life and the DeepSonic performing better in any situation according to Cliff, but it reduces the usable time to 8 hours.

I am leaning towards the Intents, which may not be as good in loud noise, but were really good across my 30 day trial, for 90% of the situations I wore them in. 20 hours battery life and more compact, if a bit wider than prior aids I have used, they seem more practical.

Unfortunately there was scant detail on the Spheres in normal ERA programmes which makes it difficult to decide…

Let see what reviews from real world users says…

In reply to @e1405

I’m confident the Spheres will still be quite functional hearing aids in 2026. There will likely be a new and improved model by then, but I’m guessing changes will be subtle.

Edited

Just about every hearing aid that I have purchased seems to be a compromise of features. That being said, the holy grail in the hearing aid industry is cracking the code on hearing properly in very noisy environments like busy restaurants, parties, large family dinners, sports events, etc). That is what is so intriguing to me about the new Sphere’s and their chip. If it really works well, I will beg, borrow and steal the money to buy them even with their battery limitations and knowing there will be a better version in a few years. As someone who still works in the business world and has a very active lifestyle, being finally able to hear normally in noisy environments is a huge quality of life thing for me. Let’s all be honest here…who doesn’t get a bit anxious knowing you are going to party and it will be embarrassing when you have to keep asking people to repeat themselves.

I’m going to remain skeptical until I start my trial in the next few weeks and have a chance to put the new platform through my own version of a hearing aid torture test. I’m already used to topping up my Lumity hearing aids during the day so nothing new for me with the Sphere’s. The only issue I can see with the AI battery drain is going to a wedding, etc. My son is getting married in a few weeks and the wedding will go from about 6 pm until well after midnight. I honestly don’t see the AI program making it through an evening like that. Dr. Cliff seems to say that the AI program will burn a full day’s battery in 7 hours.

JordanK

I guess there in lies the question…

Calm situations… most modern hearing aids are great.

At the beach (moderate noise) talking to friends the Intents work very well… (my existing Paradises dont) how well will the ERA chip in the Spheres cope?

Meetings (noise) the Intents work well… ERA chip…?

In restaurants (fairly loud noise) the Intents work well… how well will the ERA chip cope?

In pubs, and parties (really loud noise) the Intents work fairly well…I am sure the DeepSonic will be better.

Sometimes I have 18-20 hours days, I have never had to recharge.

Looking forward to a review on the standard ERA based aids or the Spheres in ERA programmes… (ie calm, speech in noise, music, calls, echo rooms etc)

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