I use top-of-the line Resound hearing aids, bought from Costco for $2,717.97, a fraction of what they’d cost from an independent audiologist. I got them because I listen to a lot of classical music and had found cheaper hearing aids lacking. They work well controlled with the Resound Smart 3D app on my phone which has adjustable settings for ordinary use, noisy environments like restaurants, and music. There are even three-band adjustable equalizer settings to tweak the sound in particular instances. I’m a long-time audiophile with high-end loss which so far can be mostly compensated for by the aids, so I can enjoy my SACDs on my 5.1 surround sound system and other high-fidelity sources, including live musical performances.
One of the ironies of life is that a lot of people with enough money to have high-end audio systems are old enough to need hearing aids.
No feedback problems such as I’ve had with other hearing aids.
When out walking or working in the yard I can pair them with the iPhone and stream podcasts directly to my ears with no telltale cord dangling.
However, I would not use them to stream music directly from the iPhone. Unless you have something like ear protectors covering them they will sound terribly tinny, and even with ear protectors they will scant low midrange and below frequencies. In normal use they are set only to amplify upper midrange and high-range sound.
iPhone calls route the incoming sound directly to my ears, but I have to remember to speak into the phone to convey the sound outward.
Also I learned the hard way to be extra-careful using noise-cancelling earmuffs with them on. I was blowing leaves on our lawn last spring, wearing a pair so I could listen to a podcast while the noisy leaf-blower was going, and when I temporarily pulled them off to attend to something one earpiece caught hold of one of the old aids I was wearing, pulled it off, and blew into the pile of flying leaves, to be lost forever.
Fortunately we have a lost-property rider on our home insurance which paid for all but $1000 of the cost of the new aids, plus another sum from our health insurance. That’s how I wound up with these super aids.
But this morning, I did vacuum the whole house listening to a podcast while wearing the muffs, being extra careful not to snag the aids.
To sum up: hearing aids are not a substitute for high-end earphones or even earbuds, but they can be great aids for those of us with hearing loss for listening to live or recorded music coming through the air to our aids and ears, understanding speech in noisy environments, and low-fi listening streamed from iPhones,
Paul Brians
Bainbridge Island, WA