Listening to aids: Not just for the near-deaf? We’ve already seen one product within the rising class of listening to aids designed for customers with comparatively gentle listening to loss—the Olive Union Olive Max. Now there’s Elehear’s Alpha Professional, one other inexpensive over-the-counter product that goals to acclimate customers to what listening to aids can do … earlier than issues attain disaster mode.
Elehear’s Alpha Professional doesn’t break any new floor within the design division, providing a conventional behind-the-ear design with a receiver related to the first machine through a skinny wire—maybe only a bit longer than most. The items can be found solely in a darkish grey coloration, which I discover extra aesthetically pleasing and unobtrusive than the extra widespread silver or beige (yech).
{Photograph}: Elehear
The items arrive unconfigured, however new customers get a free 30-minute on-line session with an audiologist in the event that they need assistance setting issues up and getting the lay of the land. In the event you’re a first-time listening to support consumer, this can be a good concept, because the audiologist can information you thru which settings and eartips are more likely to work greatest for you, to not point out present normal utilization and cleansing suggestions. The audiologist (there’s only one at Elehear) can even assist later, on an advert hoc foundation, through telephone and e mail.
The Alpha Professional’s {hardware} controls are easy, with a person quantity rocker on the again of every unit. They may work out of the field, with out Elehear’s app, however you’ll have to delve into mentioned app if you wish to get probably the most out of the listening to aids. Whereas the app is straightforward on the floor, there’s much more to it beneath. Naturally, particular person quantity controls dominate the primary display screen, with choices for controlling the quantity of ambient noise discount plus the flexibility to choose between a forward-facing speech focus or a 360-degree listening mode. I additionally discovered the Mute button right here useful, which cuts out all amplification and allows you to work in silence do you have to want some peace and quiet.
The Alter tab enables you to drill down additional, the place you’ll discover 4 presets that correspond to varied ranges of listening to loss, from Gentle to Reasonable II. Elehear’s audiologist informed me these are all tuned primarily based on widespread listening to loss patterns—boosting high-level frequencies greater than decrease ones—however you may tweak them additional by tapping the Edit icon, which opens a rudimentary equalizer the place you may set ranges for Ocean Wave, World Sound, and Birds Chirping (i.e. lows, mids, and highs). All the settings on this display screen could be made globally or per-ear. There are additionally 4 environmental modes—Common, Restaurant, Outside, and TV—that are pretty self-explanatory. Elehear says the one actual distinction amongst them is the quantity of noise discount together with using the directional focus mode.
{Photograph}: Elehear
