Whether you’re a hearing aid novice or an old pro, the information in this guide can help you get the most out of your technology.
The newest hearing aids feature connectivity options that connect directly with televisions, phones, and other electronics without a gangly wire.
This can be a significant benefit in situations with lots of background noise. But be aware that not all devices are compatible with all hearing aids, and manufacturers have different features.
Binaural Technology
Binaural technology is an audio tool that can help you achieve peak performance. It can enhance focus, meditation, creativity, and sleep. In addition, it can help you improve your mood and relieve anxiety.
The basic idea behind binaural technology is that it can help you hear and feel different frequencies, which can alter your brain waves. This is done through a process called brainwave entrainment.
To do this, you need to create two different sound frequencies, one in each ear. Doing so can cause your brain to synchronize with the sounds.
There are five categories of brain waves or frequency patterns: Delta (d), Theta (t), Alpha (a), Beta (b), and Gamma (g). Each affects explicitly different parts of the mind, including relaxation, focus, creativity, and sleep.
Gamma waves can enhance cognitive flexibility, attention, and divergent thinking. They can also promote deep sleep and healing.
In addition, they can reduce anxiety and increase creativity. They can even help you learn faster and retain more information.
However, you should be aware that binaural technology is not a cure-all. If you use it too long, you may experience side effects such as fatigue or dizziness.
You should avoid listening to binaural beats while driving. Listening to them with headphones would be best for the best results.
The basic binaural recording technique involves placing microphones in ear-like cavities on either side of a stand or dummy head to capture the sound in its true-to-life form. It is an upgrade from stereo since it captures and processes sound precisely as a human ear would hear it.
Noise Reduction
Hearing aid technology like the EarPros has been developed to improve the quality of communication by removing unwanted sounds that may affect the overall listening experience. Unwanted noises include echoes, echoes of other people’s conversations, and general ambient sounds.
The human ear receives pressure waves in the air, which are converted into electrical signals and sent to the brain for processing. Once the brain has processed these signals, we can hear and understand what we hear.
However, we often want to listen to something other than a particular sound. That’s because the environment, our mood, and other factors can change how we perceive what we hear.
Several different DNR algorithms have been developed, each with strengths and weaknesses. Some algorithms have a high degree of accuracy, but others are prone to reducing the various dimensions of audio quality.
Directional Microphones
Unlike omnidirectional microphones, directional microphones focus speech directly on the wearer. These microphones can help reduce sound distortion and allow the hearing aid user to hear more explicit speech, even in loud environments.
Most directional microphones have a pickup pattern that primarily captures sound from the front, a little bit from the sides, and almost nothing from the rear. This type of microphone is called a cardioid microphone, named for its heart shape pickup pattern.
This type of microphone is most useful for conferences and boardroom meetings, where all participants need dedicated mic coverage. Often, a directional microphone will be used with adaptive noise reduction technology to narrow the listening area and focus on the closest speech signal.
In addition to gathering sounds, directional microphones can also change the directionality of speech signals to make them easier to hear in noisy environments. This technology is commonly referred to as “spatial processing” and can be found in many styles of hearing aids.
When a directional microphone is fitted incorrectly, it can significantly impact directivity. This is because the tilt angle of the microphone can change, affecting how well it attenuates non-target direction sounds.
For this reason, it is important for audiologists to regularly check and clean the directional microphone ports to ensure that no debris is affecting the device’s sensitivity.
This is especially true when a hearing aid is undergoing regular testing, as changes in the microphone’s directionality may affect the hearing aid’s overall performance. In a single-microphone directional design, it is also possible that debris can cause a mismatch in the microphone’s sensitivity.
Feedback Suppression
Feedback suppression eliminates audio feedback or sounds that leak from a receiver or microphone into the listening environment. In addition to improving speech understanding, feedback suppression also reduces the amount of background noise in meetings and classrooms.
Many audio solutions on the market offering automatic feedback suppression. These include various notch filters that automatically detect and remove feedback frequencies. Some also utilize adaptive filter models that improve acoustic transfer between the speaker and microphone to eliminate feedback.
Another option is frequency-shifting technology. This technique, the oldest feedback suppression method, involves shifting the frequency of the system response to increase gain before feedback occurs. However, this technique only produces modest improvement in growth before feedback is detected. Additionally, it can create noticeable pitch distortion in music programs.
