Hearing aid question
Decades ago I at least thought of myself as a bit of a "Golden Ear"; my Quad ELS/Pyramid supertweeter combo and associated electronics were a source of pride and joy. (All gone over the years, alas.) In recent years I have learned that I have essentially lost the top three octaves of my auditory frequency response, whether through natural aging or some other process I'm not sure; I also have a fair bit of tinnitus at this stage, but that has proved less of an issue in being able to enjoy music. So now I've gone from enjoying the transparent reproduction of great music to struggling to resolve the sibilants in my wife's speech. (In the overall scheme of things, the latter is arguably more important, at least in maintaining peace at home.) I still very much enjoy listening to music, but the high-end losses have somewhat diminished the joy of it.
I am of course starting to think about taking the leap into hearing aids as a genuine quality-of-life enhancement. I was wondering if anyone out there has dealt with similar issues, and perhaps formed opinions about which of the many available solutions has worked best as both a general lifestyle aid and a boost to their enjoyment of live and recorded music. Many thanks in advance.
@rcm1203 If you buy them, please let me know your impressions. I plan to buy them as a birthday present for myself 😎 in early July. Wife can’t say no if it’s for my birthday… right? For those on the thread, I recommend you take the time to read the Grand Piano Passions review. |
A couple other thoughts. IMHO don’t knock Costco unless you tried them. Their testing equipment is outstanding and brand availability and pricing is unmatched. I ended up buying from an audiologist, but Costco was very good. |
This is such a great topic. I also have hearing loss at the high-end frequencies. I purchased the top-of-the line Starkey hearing aids, thinking they would make music sound fantastic once again. I was disappointed to discover they didn't. Per the audiologist, hearing aids are designed to improve hearing from other people, not music. She even setup a "music" mode, but I found it didn't work very well. As others have noticed, if you cup your hands behind your ears when you wear hearing aids, music sound significantly better. I'm not sure why this works, but it does. However, it's not practical (or comfortable) to listen to music with your hands cupped behind your ears. I wish someone would invent a device that has the same effect -- I would buy immediately. My only suggestion is to buy speakers that compensate for the sound frequencies where you have hearing deficiencies. I have hearing loss at the high frequencies, so I enjoy listening to speakers that others would consider bright (such as B&W or Paradigm). An amplifier that has a built-in equalizer might also do the trick, but I personally haven't tried that approach.      |
I’ll throw in my 2 cents:  The longer you go needing hearing aids, the greater the loss of hearing.  Specifically, word recognition.  And, once it’s gone it’s gone FOREVER.  HiFi is a hobby:  hearing is a gift. For those who claim their high frequency hearing is distorted with hearing aids, use the app to adjust the frequency or simply toe OUT the tweeter.  And for tinnitus, cut out salt, drink more water and go to your ENT and get betahistine (not sold in the USA but can be made by a compounding pharmacy).  Been there. |
