Hearing aids

Thank you all so far this has been helpful. 

I've worn prescription hearing aids for over 20 years now, and they're great - everything sounds better and clearer. Music sounds much, much better. Without them, it sounds like I've got cloth over my ears. My hearing loss is part age, part hereditary and part environmental.... I'd no more go without hearing aids than I would without vision aids like glasses. 

Hearing aids have a reputation of being horrible for sound.  they traditionally amplify voice frequencies with the goal of making a person barely functional to hear directions from a caretaker.  That comes from past days when people didn't get hearing aids until they were just short of totally deaf.  

Today, hearing aids on base settings are still very voice focused but not nearly as bad.  More younger people are getting hearing aids before their hearing goes fully away.  Think about glasses.  I magine if people refused to wear glasses until they were legally blind.  But now people are realizing that hearing aids are a great help, even if you have only mild hearing loss.  

With these changes, hearing aid manufacturers are becoming more and more accomodating of the needs of users who still have a lot of hearing.  Long story how I ended up with hearing aids about 5 years ago but people were shocked when I started wearing them.  they said "i didn't know your hearing was so bad."  I said, "It's not, but now it is much better, almost like being a kid again.".  Now I can name half a dozen people at work who have followed my lead and gotten hearing aids long before they were struggling.

So what about listening to music?  for music you do not want the heavy Artificial Intelligence playing with the sounds to make them more understandable.  What you want is just amplification in the frequency ranges where you have losses.  Most hearing aids now have a "music" setting which does just that.  

I have phillips from costco and they have a "Hifi Music" setting that makes me feel like I'm a kid again.   There is an ap on my phone that I can control them with.  Now the HIFI music mode can get tiresome in a busy restuarant or noisy car.  So I use the normal mode when not listening to music.  And when I turn on hifi mode, my face just smiles.

Jerry

I use the 10K tone control to compensate for my 40db down at higher frequencies. Any negative resulting from a tone control goes unnoticed.  Perhaps, there is a slight change in soundstage.

No regrets here. Mine have app control so the amount of tip up in frequency response can be changed by slider or semi permanently by AI interface. Musically I find them mostly a positive. It depends on the source, music and volume. They’re Bluetooth connected to my smart phone and TV. Dialogue piped directly to the ear is amazingly clear. Movie soundtracks are absolute audiophile quality in the percussive instruments.

Photon46 TY for commenting. My first audiologist appointment doesn’t allow a test drive unfortunately. I have another appointment soon and maybe they offer a test drive. TY

Despite some upper frequency loss and mild tinnitus, one thing I have always been curious about is the sound quality.

From what I have read, a hearing aid is comprised of three components. A microphone, an amplifier and a speaker. The goal has always been to merely amplify sound volume, with some tweaking of frequency curve.

What I wonder about, given the quality of current in ear monitors and DSP processing, why isn’t there the option to have an audiologist analyze one’s hearing, apply correction and output it via high quality IEM technology?

Granted, this may result in a much larger hearing "aid" than what is typical, but these would be used more for critical listening, rather than listening to traffic and your significant other while driving.

2psyop

thank you for your service!!!

I have enjoyed music nearly my entire 71 years but paid the price on a Roger Waters The Wall concert that gave me hearing loss and tinnitus. I have a very nice audio system that I know I could enjoy more if I could go back a few years. A recent audiology appointment confirmed I have significant hearing loss. I am about to pull the trigger on aids but thought it was worth asking other audio fans. Ty

Great question. Fortunately one I haven’t had to ask yet, despite too many loud concerts when young.

This question has been repeatedly asked over many years in numerous forums and the result is always the same: everyone's experience is different. Some found no worthwhile benefits, others found quality aids transformative (my audio loving wife's experience,) and everything in between. There are so many different kinds of hearing problems it's hard to draw conclusions about your case from someone else's experience. Hopefully you live in a state that allows you to try them without committing to purchase (as is the case here in Florida.) You would be out the cost of an audiologist's visit and hearing testing if they don't work out, but I image most of us have spent more on more than one audio purchase that didn't meet expectations ;-). Good luck!

I have hearing loss from the military. First unit Aid Defense Artillery and next unit Field Artillery . I have Resound hearing aids and YES they help alot. If you like listening to audio, you will never hear your sound system correctly with a hearing deficiency. Get a hearing test and hearing aids and thank me later. My system sounds great with hearing aids and when I take them off, it goes dull. The life gets sucked out along with the frequency range I can't hear.