I've always been pleased with my sound system, which has five full range speakers, and I've taken a lot of care in setting them up for excellent results.
I have, however, had to admit in the last couple of years or so that I am suffering from a degree of age related hearing loss.
In my case this means that I have been tending to lose low level sounds, and there has also been a lack of definition, hard to describe but enough to cause dissatisfaction. I notice the problem more acutely when listening to familiar favourites.
What to do? Well, after having a bad experience with one hearing aid supplier I decided to go to the audiologist at my local hospital. He carried out very meticulous tests before fitting me up with some aids, and the result in conversation was a striking improvement. Unfortunately this was not the case with my stereo, everything was overlaid with stridency, and it was painful to listen to. I decided that it was best to listen to music without the aids, but this was a nuisance.
Now, here's the fun part. The aids have three fixed settings of which the default position seems the best, but there is also a small button on each unit which allows you to decrease the sensitivity in six increments, I'm not sure if these are 1 dB steps. After a lot of experimentation I finally arrived at a setting of-4 on this small control. I can now listen to my system without altering its own controls, and the improvement is remarkable, with a more natural frequency response and a wider stereo separation. I've tried to be sceptical, saying to myself that it's just wish fulfilment, but no, it's real enough. I must stress that this is not the sort of improvement beloved of hi-fi buffs experimenting with speaker cables or green pens, but something quite dramatic.
Now of course the aids have helped to put back some of the frequency loss in my ears, and I understand that if something seeps away slowly it might take time to become aware that it has gone missing, but this has been really dramatic.
I often listen to music with my partner, and thus we now have a situation where he hears the same performance but it will sound quite different. It follows that whenever we listen to music, either live or recorded, we could have half a dozen hearers, all with a range of listening variability which could be quite marked.
I wonder, how does this affect reviewers listening at home before broadcasting a BAL or a comparative analysis of different performances? I know for a fact that critics on CD Review listen on widely differing systems, both at home and in the studio, and there's no doubt in my mind that this affects judgement, not only of the sound, but also of the performance. What do others on these boards think?
I have, however, had to admit in the last couple of years or so that I am suffering from a degree of age related hearing loss.
In my case this means that I have been tending to lose low level sounds, and there has also been a lack of definition, hard to describe but enough to cause dissatisfaction. I notice the problem more acutely when listening to familiar favourites.
What to do? Well, after having a bad experience with one hearing aid supplier I decided to go to the audiologist at my local hospital. He carried out very meticulous tests before fitting me up with some aids, and the result in conversation was a striking improvement. Unfortunately this was not the case with my stereo, everything was overlaid with stridency, and it was painful to listen to. I decided that it was best to listen to music without the aids, but this was a nuisance.
Now, here's the fun part. The aids have three fixed settings of which the default position seems the best, but there is also a small button on each unit which allows you to decrease the sensitivity in six increments, I'm not sure if these are 1 dB steps. After a lot of experimentation I finally arrived at a setting of-4 on this small control. I can now listen to my system without altering its own controls, and the improvement is remarkable, with a more natural frequency response and a wider stereo separation. I've tried to be sceptical, saying to myself that it's just wish fulfilment, but no, it's real enough. I must stress that this is not the sort of improvement beloved of hi-fi buffs experimenting with speaker cables or green pens, but something quite dramatic.
Now of course the aids have helped to put back some of the frequency loss in my ears, and I understand that if something seeps away slowly it might take time to become aware that it has gone missing, but this has been really dramatic.
I often listen to music with my partner, and thus we now have a situation where he hears the same performance but it will sound quite different. It follows that whenever we listen to music, either live or recorded, we could have half a dozen hearers, all with a range of listening variability which could be quite marked.
I wonder, how does this affect reviewers listening at home before broadcasting a BAL or a comparative analysis of different performances? I know for a fact that critics on CD Review listen on widely differing systems, both at home and in the studio, and there's no doubt in my mind that this affects judgement, not only of the sound, but also of the performance. What do others on these boards think?