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My Phonak Sphere Infinio I90 vs Lumity L90 Shootout

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In reply to @JordanK

Hi Jordan; thanks for your reporting on the Sphere Infinios vs the Lumity’s!! Based on your comments and several others, I would love to give the Sphere’s a try!. I currently have Phonak Naida Lumity P90s which I just got less than 1 year ago. It is difficult for me to justify the cost of another pair of in such a short time. I had my previous GN Resound Quattros for 7 years before changing, just to catch up with technology. What would you suggest?
Thanks
Mick

Hi @user1066

I was sorta in the same boat as you. I bought my Lumity L90’s exactly two years ago and they were expensive. For me to replace them at the two year mark is a bit financially painful too. After dealing with hearing loss for all these years and going through many sets of hearing aids, my advice is always to do an extensive trial of the hearing aids before purchasing.

In Canada (Ontario) I believe audiologists are required to give you up to 90 days before returning or purchasing but I think a good trial time is about 4-6 weeks. You need to find an audiologist who is not only ok with this, but will take the time to setup them up properly (including full testing) and then will provide a number of follow-up adjustment appointments to fine tune the hearing aids. If your audiologist isn’t ok with this, find someone else. IMHO, it’s difficult to determine if a new hearing aid technology provides incremental value with just a 1-2 week quickie type of trial.

As I’ve stated in my previous posts, the biggest reasons to upgrade to Sphere is the new Spheric noise reduction program and the extended rechargeable battery life of these new hearing aids. If you almost never find yourself in noisy places (i.e. restaurants, pubs, sports events, etc), it might not be worth the high cost of the upgrade. You really need to do a test and decide if it is worth it.

One of the interesting things I’ve discovered during my trial is that I am actually not in these really noisy place more than a few times a week. This is much less than I thought. That being said, I think part of the reason it’s only a few times a week is that I have historically tried to avoid these places because it’s awkward for me. You really have to wonder how many other hearing impaired people are in the same situation.

Hope this helps. I’m back to my audiologist on Tuesday for some more adjustments. I had him make some changes to my streaming and music program settings and it’s now a bit worse. I was watching Netflix last night with my wife via the Phonak TV Connector 2 and the speech clarity is slightly compressed sounding. Everything sounds ok when I place a call on my iPhone but streaming is definitely not as good after he adjusted it. I believe the Sphere’s have two streaming programs (“Media speech + mic” and “Media music + mic”). I think mobile phone calls use the first one and streaming from Mobile Music, Apps, TV Connector 2 use the second one. I think he messed up the second one to make music sound better but speech clarity suffered in the process. I’m going to have him revert it back and try again.

Hope this is helpful.

Jordan

Thank you Jordan for your prompt and thoughtful response. I totally agree re: length of trial period. We have a very sound- reflective kitchen/eating area, and often 7 at the table. I struggle through every meal, and am very interested to know if the Sphere’s would change my world at home. Very infrequently do I go other places or we have a larger crowd, but when that happens it is a lost cause and painful for me.

Mick

Edited

I’m considering taking the plunge since I’m 78 and probably don’t have a whole lot of years left ahead of me - so I might as well enjoy the best hearing possible while I can.

I did really like the Speech Enhancer feature of the Lumitys. Since I have a soft-spoke wife, if the Sphere Speech Enhancer feature is anywhere near as good that would certainly be a plus on top of the benefit of Spheric noise reduction.

But here’s the question. Since my soft-spoken wife is even harder to hear in noisy environments, will Spheric noise reduction work on top or in conjunction with Speech Enhancer. Ideally, Spheric noise reduction would eliminate as much sound reduction as possible and then Speech Enhancer would kick in on top of that to boost the volume of my wife’s voice.

Unfortunately, I don’t think that will be how it works as, IIRC, Speech Enhancer only works in quiet to moderately noisy environments. But maybe just Spheric noise reduction by itself will make the wife’s voice come through loud and clear?

In reply to @tph

@tph

I have little bit older Paradise P90 hearing aids. I’ve never used the tinnitus feature. I tried it, and had it taken off immediately. I don’t like tinnitus. My paradise aids play a sound I choose so it’s louder than my tinnitus. That’s covering up a bad noise with another bad noise. Nope. Not for me

In reply to @JordanK

My Paradise hearing aids were awful. It was the setup.

I read your comments and celebrate the master that’s setting them up. And truly appreciate your reviews and help

In reply to @jim_lewis

@jim_lewis said:

But here’s the question. Since my soft-spoken wife is even harder to hear in noisy environments, will Spheric noise reduction work on top or in conjunction with Sound Enhancer. Ideally,

I believe Speech Enhancer only works in Calm while Spheric noise reduction works in loud noise. I found that I could hear my wife much better in loud noise than I could with the Lumity 90s. I also have the Speech Enhancer engaged in calm. My motivation was much the same as you at 85 yo.

In reply to @hearing-love_loss

@hearing-love_loss said:

Do you know Spanish, Chinese or other foreign language? Can you speak to some foreigner/language-speaker in foreign tongue and report back how easy it was to follow the conversation and how many % of words did you understand effortlessly?

It appears that Spheric has been trained in multiple languages and across all age groups, including children:

image

Source:

Today I was in the restaurant and I have to say that Spheric were not as good as hoped.
I think I was hoping for too much, but sometimes they sounded similar to the Resound Nexia. Not bad at all but “strange”.
Well everyone should test it on his own, I couldn’t really find a different between Spheric and the normal speech in noise.

@Misterref78 It would be helpful if you would post your . I believe that how helpful the Sphere is, is greatly dependent on the extent and type of your hearing loss. Those with light or moderate hearing loss would not benefit as much as those of us with severe hearing loss.

I contacted TruHearing to find out what discount they’d offer on the Sphere 90s. It seems they only sell the IR90 model, which, according to the web, is the top-of-the-line Infinio model without the Spheric noise reduction chip. According to the Internet, the 90 model with the Spheric noise reduction chip is the I90 (without the R).

In reply to @raylock1

Thanks, Ray. I did see ZipHearing’s prices. I like the audiologist I hooked up with through TruHearing, so I planned to call her on Monday to see if she has some alternatives like ZipHearing. With ReSound, since I had some equipment failures, it was convenient to drive just a few miles, hand the over to her, and get a replacement within a week. With coaxing, she’d do for me, too. So, I will hear what she says before I go with ZipHearing or anyone else.

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