Hearing aid question

Eric,

I'm musician and audiophile and was in the same boat so after a lot of reviews I've decide it to go with Widex Moment 440 and very happy with it, all the details that I've be missed it's back with a natural sound.This aids it's amazing.

As the original poster, I've been pleased and surprised by the number of thoughtful responses--and I certainly don't want to discourage further discourse on the subject. I've learned a lot, but one obvious conclusion is that there is no single best answer, and that there is no substitute for research. It probably makes the most sense to divide the whole hearing-aid question into two parts, one dealing with basic quality of life (i.e., conversational competence and the like) and the other dealing with the experience of live and recorded music; I've made a lot of compromises regarding the latter over the past few decades, but I can still make the case that music is actually part of my "quality of life" as well.

My impression is that the Costco experience, in terms of support and quality of offerings, would actually be a bit better than just saying 'Costco' might suggest. When I am in a position to do so, I will probably at least make some preliminary inquiries there. I suspect their offerings would probably be "good enough" as far as conversation and other basic functions are concerned. This discussion has provided a lot of helpful input with respect to the music question, certainly by introducing some names (e.g., Widex) that I might not otherwise have encountered during a routine search. By all means, carry on, and thanks again for all the responses so far.

I have a similar hearing loss.  Hearing is normal up to about 2 k then falls sharply after that.  About 5 years ago I purchased my first set of hearing aids.  My current devices are Signia AX.  I have 6 hearing settings universal, noisy environment, television, recorded music, outdoor sport, and stroll.

My audiologist had tweaked the universal profile to boost upper frequencies by about 2 db to help with hearing conversations.  The recorded music profile takes the 2db boost away.

If I listen to music on the universal profile highs will seem a bit bright and harsh.  On the recorded music profile it clears it up immensly.

After going to the hearing aids my quality of life and enjoyment of music has increased.

I have seen some people here fretting about the da converters in the hearing aids and so on.  Never occurred to me to worry about that.

The cost of the hearing aids was very reasonable at about $2100 for the pair.  For me this is a great investment.

Do they sound the same as my original equipment (ears) no but getting the harmonics back through the hearing aids has given me plenty of enjoyment.

Just my 2 cents worth.

One more thing.  The hearing aids I have have 48 frequency bands for the audiologist to adjust hearing with.  I got mine though my insurance and they are a rebranded signia hearing aid which is why the price is relatively low.