Phone review addition/improvement

lazer

Posts: 484   +151
As a hearing impaired person, I suffer much from being able to hear what is said, especially over the phone it is very difficult for me. People seem to get upset that I can't understand them and keep asking them to slow down and speak clearer. I even have had people slam the phone down on me,

What would help me is a review of phones' quality of sound reproduction. This means how close to normal is the speakers ability to reproduce the spoken word?

I bought several different phones and wear hearing aids but I would really like to get a phone not based on it camera or speed (even though that is important) but on the quality of sound reproduction.
 
WOW! thank you so much.

After I read it I realized it is not what I wanted.
Why?
It tells of ability to use with hearing aids or not bother hearing aids, but my main point was the speaker ability to reproduce accurately sound.
So many people think louder is better, but it is not. Clearer is better. Sure it has to be loud enough to hear, but if you understand hearing loss, you will know that the loss is not equal in all sounds equally. I do not hear treble well but I have no problem with bass sounds, so making it louder does not help. I need to raise up the treble without raising the bass.
 
Last edited:
I do not hear treble well but I have no problem with bass sounds, so making it louder does not help.
you are looking for an EQUALIZER. You describe what is known as the
Fletcher-Munson effect -- google for description -- and then look for a headset with equalizer controls
 
An equalizer is neccessary, but you don't realize that it depends on the quality or the ability of the speaker in the phone to recreate the sound as it is spoken or actually played. If you don't have a hearing problem, so you can understand quite well the voice over the phone, but when you do not hear well, meaning some tones are bad and others are good, you need a phone speaker that can reproduce the voice as it is spoken.
 
The equalizer will do quite well, but don't spend large amounts of time looking for what doesn't exist. I'm a septuagenarian myself and trained in classical music so well versed in sound quality. Websites and mobile devices will never produce "quality sound" and certainly not if you have major hearing loss in the upper-midrange to the limits of the human ear.
 
Well, here's a news story on the subject:
Accessibility Features for Hearing Loss on iOS 14
Headphone Accommodations

“This new accessibility feature is designed to amplify soft sounds and adjust certain frequencies for an individual’s hearing, to help music, movies, phone calls, and podcasts sound more crisp and clear.”

Screenshots of Headphone Accommodations settings and Custom Audio Setup for Headphone Accommodations.

Screenshots of Headphone Accommodations settings and Custom Audio Setup for Headphone Accommodations on an iPhone 11 Pro Max running iOS 14 dev beta 1. There’s also this cool Custom Audio Setup where it plays two audio samples of subtle frequency boosting settings and you choose which version sounds best. It helps you tune the Headphone Accommodations settings.

During the keynote, Apple mentioned that it also works with Transparency mode on AirPods Pro, that it will make “quiet voices more audible and tuning the sounds of your environment to your hearing needs”.

Headphone Accommodations is available on Apple and Beats headphones featuring the H1 headphone chip, such as second generation AirPods, AirPods Pro, Powerbeats Pro and more, as well as EarPods.
 
Back