TV head phones

JNDATHP

JNDATHP

IPCT+ Member
Oct 16, 2018
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Florida, USA
A little background. For the last few years we have closed captioning turned in our TVs because of hearing loss.

Unfortunately, my wife’s hearing is much worse than mine and I am looking for a solution.

Does anyone have experience with wireless headphones?

Our setup is just a TV in each room except for our living room. We have a Sonos Playbar connected to the optical out and have two Sonos speakers for surround.

We are getting hearing aids for her which may help but I am looking for a plan B just in case.
 
My wife Bluetooth's our 2019 Sony Bravia 65" TV to some cheap rechargeable BT headphones I paid $12 for at Dollar General last year. She's very picky but swears they work great at about 15 feet AND are comfortable.

I'm sure there are better ones out there but my intent is to state that range and sound quality can likely only get better > $12! :cool:
 
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You may find that using wireless headphones disables the TV speakers. I wear Widex hearing aids and have a Widex TV Play connected to my TV that streams audio directly to my hearing aids and it's completely independent of the TV speaker volume level so others can watch TV at a comfortable sound level for them, but I also still use closed caption. Phonak has a similar streaming device but I like the Widex much better and I think ReSound has one as well. Check out the hearing aid and hearing loss support group on Facebook which will help you a lot especially as your wife transintions into wearing hearing aids, plus share experiences and recommendations. Hearing Aid and Hearing Loss Support Group | Facebook
 
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JNDATHP said:
We are getting hearing aids for her which may help but I am looking for a plan B just in case.
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FWIW, I'm the one with the hearing loss and couldn't hear the TV and her hearing OK (the BT headphones are for when I wanted to take a nap).
I got my hearing aides in November at the VA and am very pleased. They are BT'd to an app on my Android phone so I can adjust them, take a pho
ne call, etc. I think they would have set me back about $2.5K if I had to have bought them myself. They're the Phonak brand and I like them, they're helped a lot.
 
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JNDATHP said:
The Dollar General link goes to a sign in requirement. Thanks
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Strange...works for me and I don't even have a DG online account. Oh, well....they're cheap and I don't particularly recommend them anyway but it demonstrates how simple the process is even with cheap ones operated by a wife who's tech challenged. :cool:
 
JNDATHP said:
Hearing aids are new to us so I appreciate any comments on what you or your spouse use. Thanks.
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One thing you will quickly learn in the world of hearing aids is that everyone is different. It's important to find a good audiologist to help select the best hearing aid for the specific type of hearing loss being treated. People with only mild hearing loss have different needs than someone with more severe or profound hearing loss that require hearing aids with better correction capability. Most insurance plans don't cover the cost of hearing aids but many people are happy with Costco. I had my hearing tested locally by my ENT doctor's office but I purchased my Widex hearing aids from Fit Hearing because they were half the cost for the exact same thing. Fit Hearing offers the same level of warranty support and programming as the ENT office but at half the price. Buy Hearing Aids Online | See Audiologists for Online Remote Care
 
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The new hearing aids will connect to your smart TV, provided it has a bluetooth audio output, which I believe is Blue Tooth 5.1 and up.. My wife has those. My hearing aids are too old for those. My TV in my mancave has bluetooth output, but I believe the bluetooth on my hearing aids is like......2.0? I never could get them to link up via bluetooth, but I could get my Denon amplifier to connect, no problem. :wtf: Needless to say, I am too cheap to buy new hearing aids, especially when these still work. Have you seen the prices these new hearing aids are running now?? My first new car didn't cost that much!! :angry:
 
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Smilingreen said:
The new hearing aids will connect to your smart TV, provided it has a bluetooth audio output, which I believe is Blue Tooth 5.1 and up.. My wife has those. My hearing aids are too old for those. My TV in my mancave has bluetooth output, but I believe the bluetooth on my hearing aids is like......2.0? I never could get them to link up via bluetooth, but I could get my Denon amplifier to connect, no problem. :wtf: Needless to say, I am too cheap to buy new hearing aids, especially when these still work. Have you seen the prices these new hearing aids are running now?? My first new car didn't cost that much!! :angry:
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In general I've found that the Bluetooth implementation really sucks on most hearing aids regardless of brand and there's lots of variability depending on the specific devises being used. My hearing aids retail for $6,500 but the Bluetooth performance is still erratic at times, however part of this is because hearing aids must conserve power usage and their main priority and purpose is audio signal processing and not Bluetooth signal strength or performance so there's a lot going on inside those tiny earpieces that have limited battery power capacity available. I should add, now that hearing aids are available over the counter hopefully that will help drive down the prices of the higher end models as well since there is more competition.
 
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Alaska Country said:
One other consideration is digital processing delay. If it takes too long to convert audio to blue tooth there may be loss of lip sync which some folks object to. It would be like watching a foreign film with dialog overdubbed in English.
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I've not had any signal delay issues related to Bluetooth. However, if I have TV audio streaming through my hearing aids but can also hear the TV speakers via ambient audio it can get interesting and sounds like I'm in a theatre. My hearing aid app allows me to adjust the balance between ambient audio noise and TV volume streaming through the hearing aids which is really nice if people around you are talking or if you want the TV sound to be more in the background.
 
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Does your TV support BlueTooth? And does it support more than one BlueTooth device at a time. Your Sonos soundbar might. Usually the HDMI ARC (eARC) connection is going to be much better than an optical connection. Also, see if your soundbar has "voice enhancement" option. I just bought a Samsung soundbar because we've been having the CC on for sometime due to the low voice channel but high music/effects blowing us out so we turn it down then can't quite hear the voices. The soundbar with voice enhancement was a gamechanger.

Also, I have a couple of pairs of these I wear at night while the girlfriend is sleeping and in the daytime when she is working remotely on her computer. They are great and have noise cancellation feature too.

 
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