Ok so it’s taken a while, but I think the results are interesting.
Let’s go back to the original question. If you are going to spend thousands, even tens of thousands, on an audio system, should you as part of the investment plan consider your hearing health?
Given that the general statistics say that those who invest considerable sums are of a ‘certain age’ and at said certain age hearing is likely to have deteriorated then it makes sense doesn’t it? We spend time selecting and then tweaking both our equipment and space to tune it to our tastes but neglect to address what could be the elephant in the room.
For some it won’t matter. I’d suggest that the vanity of admitting some level of hearing loss far outweighs the bravado in owning expensive kit that is the ‘real’ talking point. I’m not going to suggest you are wrong. If you own an Aston Martin and just drive it to the supermarket, that’s fine. Whatever makes you happy is the key point here.
However, if you are the kind of person that likes to get every gram of value from an investment, then I doubt you can afford not to address this. Personally I’ve always been comfortable with a level of compromise – I’m kind of happy just playing the game and I don’t need to win every time.
So, if you want to find out about hearing health what are the options? I have investigated a few, and there may be more, but this is what I have found and I’ll group this into three categories – online, high street, and specialist audiologist.
Background research:
For general hearing tests bear in mind that they are designed as a first port of call to see if you need a ‘general’ hearing aid. I’ll explain. Online hearing tests and those on the high street are generally available from companies that want to sell you a hearing aid….
What I learnt from this exercise is that hearing aids are mainly designed for speech with varying levels of background noise. Therefore the frequency range that is tested is 125Hz and 8kHz. Wiki will suggest that this covers mostly mid range with a little presence:
- Sub-bass – 20-60 Hz
- Bass – 60-250 Hz
- Low-mids – 250-500 Hz
- Midrange – 500 – 2kHz
- High-mids – 2-6kHz
- Presence – 4-6kHz
- Brilliance/Air – 6-20kHz
The music that you listen to is simply the recording (often manipulated) of an instrument and a voice via a microphone. Typically a piano has a low note with a frequency of approximately 27Hz and the highest note with a frequency of about 4.2kHz. A tuba apparently can go as low as 16Hz.
It’s not that simple of course and there’s differences between tonal range and harmonics, which I won’t go into because frankly it goes right over my head, so for now I’ll stay in my comfort zone and stick with the basics – 20Hz to 20kHz.
Online hearing tests:
Let’s call it what it is – an early warning sign. There are too many variables in play here. Quality of laptop to type of headphones to name just two. However it’s worth trying and if you do hit a red flag then get yourself to an audiologist.
I tried tests from three providers using a MacBook Air and some Fostex TH600 headphones.
- RNID – tested both ears together and you had to identify three numbers with varying levels of background noise.
- High St Store – tested L&R with test tones at 1kHz; 2kHz and 6kHz
- Amplifon – tested at three volume levels with frequencies of 500hZ; 1kHz; 2kHz and 4kHz and gave you a score at the end.
Audiologist at high street store:
Next I booked an appointment with an audiologist from a well known brand.
It starts with a series of health questions, so try not to mention that you use cotton buds on a daily basis! You are then placed in a booth whilst a series of tones are played out at varying volume levels. I did notice that the booth was sealed and the headphones used in this case were Sennheiser HDA300 which was a bit of a surprise as I expected some generic product. This was the first test over a range of 125Hz to 8kHz and you get a print out of the results to discuss.
The second test was with a device placed below the ear to test bone conduction. To be honest I found it a little uncomfortable which may have skewed the results.
My advice would be try not to overthink these tests. It’s easy to fall into a trap of trying to second guess when a tone is played or wondering whether you heard anything or not when you press the response button – you can’t fool the teacher, so don’t try.
Overall I found this to be a really valuable experience, and I especially learnt a lot more about ear health than I expected to. My scores were a little down around the 2-4kHz mark which I put down to a bit of a blockage that I later cleared following the audiologist’s advice. The test was free (for me) although this maybe age or specific provider related.
Specialist Audiologist:
Not to criticise the high street store because it was a valuable experience, but they are geared to selling generic hearing aids. The specialist audiologist is another story however, and this is where things really start to happen, although as yet incomplete.
I started by asking a local audiologist a simple question – “Can you test outside of the standard range of the high street stores”. Initially I got a response showing interest and asking for more information – then nothing – ghosted.
It’s a pet hate of mine when somebody can’t be bothered to reply, and it seems to be the thing these days. I get it a lot from customer enquires asking you, in some cases, to do quite a lot of work on their behalf and then nothing, just like that!
I guess part of my job is to do the background work if I want to make a sale and I totally get that, but no reply at all, even to say no thanks, really gets my goat. I have written a blog on the subject but won’t publish it – it just adds fuel to the fire rather than putting it out.
Anyway, a short journey to another audiologist yielded much better results. We only had a brief discussion and there’s hopefully more to come, but as soon as I realised that I was speaking to not only a very experienced audiologist, but a hearing aid wearer who had a love of classical music – bingo!
They even had a roller banner of a grey haired lady putting a record on her turntable…
This person totally got where I was coming from and agreed it was not only a good thing, but in some cases essential. We have more to discuss so like all good research I’ll add the ‘further research required’ tag at this stage, but below is a brief summary of the discussion:
- A specialist will tailor the test frequency range to your needs after an initial consultation.
- Part of the service may be free but you will need to pay for the professional assistance.
- If you require hearing support by means of a hearing aid they will offer the best product for you and are not necessarily tied to one or two brands
- Once you have a hearing aid they will tune it to your specific needs – service is then ongoing.
- Product investment will start at about £5K
The key takeaway here is the tuning of the device to your specific needs.
As we have said before you can buy a bunch of audio components and connect them up, but even buying ‘award winners’ doesn’t guarantee system synergy. So it makes perfect sense to tailor a solution to your needs.
Let’s face it some of you spend more on a power cable or a fuse – so why not?
