Using PC Headset with a Hearing Aid

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ToranCult

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Hello all. I am looking for a little advice.

My girlfriend has Meniere’s Disease with 90% hearing loss and wears a hearing aid. She lives in the US and I live in Scotland at the moment and I was hoping to get her hooked up on Skype and communicationg with me by voice. Due to her hearing impairment she does not often get the opportunity to chat by voice. I am hoping that we might be able to acheive this through her PC. Can any anyone recomend or help me in selecting a suitable headset for her to try? Are there any other devices you can recommend for boosting the volume, or perhaps alternate software more suitable for high volume output? Any help or advice would be hugely appreciatted.
 
Your girlfriend might want to contact her audiologist as her audiologist might be able to figure something out about how to make the sound louder.

In the meantime, did she went into Volume Control (Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> Entertainment -> Volume Control) to adjust the volume for Master and Wave slider all the way up? Does her sound card have a bass/treble (for adjusting the tone of sound)? If yes, she might also try to adjust the treble, as this will raise up the high frequency sound. I may not think this would help but tell her to give it a try.
 
Thank you GraysonPeddie. We have not yet purchesaed a headset to try. Turning the trebble up sounds excellant advice though.
 
Bear in mind that not all sound cards have bass and treble. There are some sound cards that have either a 7-band equalizer or 10-band equalizer.

Today's sound cards from Creative Labs, like Sound Blaster Audigy, Audigy 2 ZS, Audigy 4, and Sound Blaster X-Fi have both an equalizer (Start -> Programs -> Creative -> <sound card model, such as Audigy or X-Fi> -> Equalizer) and bass/treble (again, can be found in the mixer as mentioned above).

Make sure that the high frequencies don't sound distorted, If there's an equalizer, try out the equalizer first. If not enough, then boost the treble. By adjusting the treble higher, if she has a 16kHz slider (or any frequency higher or equal to 8kHz) set to +15dB (decibel), then turning up the treble higher will boost up the frequencies above 4kHz, even if the slider for 16kHz is already set to +15dB, causing the 16kHz signal to go up to 20dB or higher. If this is the case, lowering the overboosted frequencies (such as 16kHz) should help reduce the distortion.
 
thankyou, again great advice. Is a headset the best way to go? Is there any technology available allowing her to hook directkly into the hearing aid?
 
That would depend on the hearing aid she wears, but she should ask her audiologist about a DAI - direct audio input - cable.
 
ToranCult,

While DAI will give the best connection, it requires the retrofitting of a DAI Euro socket to the BTE and the time and expense involved. After that, the choice of headsets with the appropriate DAI cable and plug will be extremely limited. Also, the resultant setup is likely to be rather delicate and restricting.

Your friend might consider using her hearing aid's wireless T-coil receiver. The T-coil picks up the inductive signal from a Hearing Loop, neck loop or ear hook. Switching to the T-coil program has the added advantage that the hearing aid microphone is temporarily deactivate reducing background noise and eliminating feedback.

I am deaf in my left ear and have a BTE hearing aid in my right.
For Skype, I connect wirelessly using a single, inductive ear hook, Beetle Bluetooth which is paired to a Jabra A320S USB Bluetooth adapter. This setup actually bypasses the soundcard. The Beetle is quite loud (way more volume than I need) and the outbound and inbound sound is clear. The microphone is positioned with a lapel clip and the ear hook is very light and easy to wear. Of course, you can use the same setup to listen to CD/DVDs and PC audio.

Info about the Beetle:
Beetle Bluetooth, T-coil Inductive Headsets from TecEar.com

A corded alternative is to use another really great T-coil inductive product called the Music Link – think of Music Link as T-coil headphones that plug into your PC soundcard or MP3:
Music-Link T-coil Inductive, Ear Hooks for iPod, MP3 audio

I hope this helps.
 
Thanks HATCAT for sharing the info re. musiclink.... I will look into this as well as I love music... smile..
 
LoL ! ! ! I don't mean that headset. ofc, it's too expensive that's good for the pilot only but I don't use that kind. I only have headphone cuz I already bought a separate microphone. Don't have to have a headset.
 
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