Danish hearing aid company GN Hearing today announced the newest iteration of its IoT hearing aid solution, called the ReSound LiNX 3D, as well as new apps for the iPhone and Apple Watch.
The major update to GN's new hearing care solution is a way for users to get their hearing aids remotely fine-tuned by their audiologist after an initial fitting at their local clinic, through a cloud-based infrastructure called ReSound Smart Fit. The original ReSound LiNX allowed users to adjust their own settings on the fly, but now they can request assistance wherever they are directly from the mobile app, and their doctor can make all the adjustments necessary "to provide a better hearing experience for the user."
ReSound LiNX 3D is the only device with complete remote fine-tuning capabilities that allows users to stay in touch with their hearing care professional wherever they are, receiving hearing care and getting new settings via the cloud without having to schedule and travel for a clinic appointment. The unique cloud integration enables hearing care professionals to stay connected with users no matter where they are.
Users will be able to share feedback about any hearing difficulty as the situation occurs, rather than trying to remember how to describe it during an adjustment visit to the clinic. Hearing care professionals will have the freedom to offer follow-up services remotely – saving time for both hearing care professionals and users, and creating opportunities for even higher user satisfaction.
The ReSound LiNX 3D includes GN Hearing's 5th generation 2.4 GHz wireless technology and 3rd generation binaural directionality, providing users with "clear, natural sound, exceptional speech understanding and the best sense of where sounds are coming from." The company said that the hearing aid's advantages lie in both quiet and speech-only situations, as well as times when surrounding sounds are loud and the aid optimizes audibility of speaking voices.
The original ReSound LiNX launched with a unique 2.4 GHz protocol as well, developed in careful conjunction with Apple as a way to create a specific link between the hearing aid and iPhone devices. This technology enabled the first LiNX -- and now the new LiNX 3D -- to support a smarter system that could turn off and on quickly to save battery life, as well as geofencing abilities to intelligently detect where a user is and adapt to the corresponding new environment change with no intervention from the user.
When connected to the new apps on iPhone and Apple Watch, users will be able to access custom control features for the hearing aid, built-in guidance steps to understand the hardware and software, and coaching assistance to get the most out of the system. When compared to competitors, the company said that the ReSound LiNX 3D and companion app are up to 50 percent better at identifying speech across various environments, enable users to hear up to 80 percent more of the sounds around them, and enable users to understand up to 40 percent more speech in noise.
GN Hearing will launch the ReSound LiNX 3D, as well as a hearing aid with similar features under its sister brand Beltone, around the world later in 2017. No more information was given in today's announcement, but the company encouraged anyone interested to keep track of announcements surrounding the ReSound LiNX 3D by visiting its website.
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also... battery life: AirPods or any wireless earbuds (Bragi, Here, Samsung etc.) < 5hrs. Most hearing aids run on tiny Zinc Air coin battery that last at least a week. Recent rechargeable hearing aids run about 24hrs.
btw, AirPods do have dual mics to pick up sound directionally, as well as noise reduction, like most advanced hearing aids. After using mine for a few month now I have to say exterior build quality is entirely another level above any hearing aids.
I think the biggest difference is really the custom programming. If a cheap product is amplifying sound in a frequency you already can hear and not the frequency you can't, it's not really doing anything. A hearing aid is tuned specifically for your hearing loss (which could be totally different than someone else's). Not to mention if there's something else causing your hearing loss, smart software can't tell you that, whereas an audiologist could refer you to an ENT.
Good news is personal hearing devices (not FDA approved hearing aids) are getting better at much cheaper prices, think 500 or under. they might be ok for mild loss, but real hearing aids properly fitted still do sound better and do make a world of difference in communication (think anti-Alzheimer's and dementia). On the other hand, there are also places to get hearing aids for cheaper at places like Costco (2k vs 6k).