When fitting Oticon More1, what features will I lose if I choose NAL-NL2 and drop VAC+?

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JHC

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For Oticon high-end products, they have high-end features such as MoreSound Intelligence, MoreSound Amplifier, Soft Speech Booster, and more. Also, their Fitting Formulas are optional for VAC+.
If we look at Oticon’s low-end products, they have no high-end features, and at the same time, Fitting Formulas do not include VAC+.

So, I have two questions:
1, is there some kind of correlation between these high end features and VAC+?

2, The most important question: when fitting Oticon More1, what high-end features would I lose when I go with NAL-NL2 and drop the VAC+?

Thanks for any guidance!
 
JHC said:
For Oticon high-end products, they have high-end features such as MoreSound Intelligence, MoreSound Amplifier, Soft Speech Booster, and more. Also, their Fitting Formulas are optional for VAC+.
If we look at Oticon’s low-end products, they have no high-end features, and at the same time, Fitting Formulas do not include VAC+.

So, I have two questions:
1, is there some kind of correlation between these high end features and VAC+?

2, The most important question: when fitting Oticon More1, what high-end features would I lose when I go with NAL-NL2 and drop the VAC+?

Thanks for any guidance!
Click to expand...
What are you referring to when you say "high-end" products? Are you talking about the Tiers? Like the Oticon Real 1 is the high-end, while Oticon Real 3 is the low-end? If so, then you are wrong that low-end Oticon products don't include the VAC+ fitting rationale. VAC+ is THE BASIC and proprietary rationale used by Oticon at all tiers' levels. Even before the Oticon OPN was released (4 generations before the Intent), and even in older generations than the OPN, VAC+ is already THE STANDARD in ALL Oticon aids. It's not a reserved-for-high-end tiers feature. It's a BASIC fitting rationale that Oticon uses for ALL of their aids' models.

But if you chose the NAL-NL2 standard fitting rationale instead of the VAC+ for one your the 4 programs in the Oticon aid, you will not have the ability to use the Brightness Perception and Soft Sound Perception in Sound Controls in the Fine Tuning section anymore. Those 2 parameters are reserved for programs that use VAC+ only. Below are where those 2 parameters can be found in Genie 2. They would be greyed out when you choose a non-VAC+ program for programming.

But there's more to it than "losing" features if you don't choose VAC+. The standard fitting rationales tend to be sharper on the high end frequencies, while VAC+ wouldn't be as sharp on the high end. The sharpness is because the standard fitting rationales put a strong emphasis on speech, while VAC+ is more all-around. VAC+ might also have embedded formula to treat special cases like cookie bites hearing losses more effectively and the standard fitting rationales, or so thinks Oticon because they claim to put a lot of research into this.

Also, when your HCP does REM for you, if third party software is used for REM, they wouldn't have the proprietary VAC+ formula in their software, so your HCP will most likely make REM adjustments to a standard fitting rationale like NAL-NL2, even if the program selects VAC+ as the fitting rationale of choice. So your REM adjusted VAC+ based program will end up sounding like an NAL-NL2 program. But then you can set those 2 parameters I mentioned above as the based rationales of choice is VAC+.

1708231982071.png
 
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Volusiano said:
What are you referring to when you say "high-end" products? Are you talking about the Tiers? Like the Oticon Real 1 is the high-end, while Oticon Real 3 is the low-end? If so, then you are wrong that low-end Oticon products don't include the VAC+ fitting rationale. VAC+ is THE BASIC and proprietary rationale used by Oticon at all tiers' levels. Even before the Oticon OPN was released (4 generations before the Intent), and even in older generations than the OPN, VAC+ is already THE STANDARD in ALL Oticon aids. It's not a reserved-for-high-end tiers feature. It's a BASIC fitting rationale that Oticon uses for ALL of their aids' models.

But if you chose the NAL-NL2 standard fitting rationale instead of the VAC+ for one your the 4 programs in the Oticon aid, you will not have the ability to use the Brightness Perception and Soft Sound Perception in Sound Controls in the Fine Tuning section anymore. Those 2 parameters are reserved for programs that use VAC+ only. Below are where those 2 parameters can be found in Genie 2. They would be greyed out when you choose a non-VAC+ program for programming.

But there's more to it than "losing" features if you don't choose VAC+. The standard fitting rationales tend to be sharper on the high end frequencies, while VAC+ wouldn't be as sharp on the high end. The sharpness is because the standard fitting rationales put a strong emphasis on speech, while VAC+ is more all-around. VAC+ might also have embedded formula to treat special cases like cookie bites hearing losses more effectively and the standard fitting rationales, or so thinks Oticon because they claim to put a lot of research into this.

Also, when your HCP does REM for you, if third party software is used for REM, they wouldn't have the proprietary VAC+ formula in their software, so your HCP will most likely make REM adjustments to a standard fitting rationale like NAL-NL2, even if the program selects VAC+ as the fitting rationale of choice. So your REM adjusted VAC+ based program will end up sounding like an NAL-NL2 program. But then you can set those 2 parameters I mentioned above as the based rationales of choice is VAC+.

View attachment 458
Click to expand...
Your guide is comprehensive and fantastic.

Maybe I wasn't descriptive enough. When I say high-end I mean different series, for example, MORE is a high-end product while Zircon is a low-end product.
MORE has high-end features such as MoreSound Intelligence, MoreSound Amplifier, Soft Speech Booster, and so on. In addition, their formula includes VAC+.
Zircon, on the other hand, does not have high-end features such as MoreSound Intelligence, MoreSound Amplifier, Soft Speech Booster, and so on. In addition, their formula does not include VAC+.

But the important thing is that you answered my doubts.
According to you, if I choose the NAL-NL2 and drop the VAC+ when fitting the More1, I will not have the ability to use the Brightness Perception and Soft Sound Perception in Sound Controls in the Fine Tuning section anymore, which are supposed to be features of Soft Speech Booster. all the other high end features of the More1, are available.

You mentioned the features of VAC+, and the points to note about REM.
Thank you for your patience.
 
Thanks for your clarification about what you mean by high end vs low end (different models and not different tiers within the same model). Nevertheless, like I mentioned, the VAC+ fitting rationale is a very basic fundamental building block in Oticon aids, and is a proprietary signature of Oticon, that even the cheapest model Oticon comes out would still include the VAC+ fitting rationale. It's more likely, but not probable, that if Oticon would have to choose just 1 fitting rationale to include in their aids, that Oticon would not include the standard fitting rationales like NAL-NL2 or DSL-Adult, but they would choose to include VAC+ in their aids.
 
As I personally understand it: both VAC+, and NAL-NL2, are fitting formulas. The end result of these formulas is Gain.
On the basis of Loud, Moderate, and Soft, at different frequencies, set their respective different gains.

The VAC+ appears to have the additional feature of Soft Speech Booster, which is actually fine-tuning the gain at the appropriate frequency.
VAC-SOUND-1.jpg
VAC-SOUND-2.jpg
According to the attached diagram:
Detail+1, is a 1dB increase between 1.5k-2k for Soft.
Comfort+1, is a 2dB decrease between 125-1.5k for Soft.
Brighter+1, is a 1-2dB increase between 1.5k and greater for Loud, Moderate, and Soft.
Fuller+1, is a 1-2dB decrease between 1.5k and greater for Loud, Moderate, and Soft.

The buttons on the Sound Controls are just convenient adjustments, equivalent to the foolproof buttons.
VAC-SOUND-3.jpg

If we know this principle, we can artificially change it directly in the gain table, and also achieve the so-called Soft Speech Booster of the VAC+.
Do you agree with this view?
 
The VAC+ formula is not perfect enough for me. the NAL-NL2 is also not enough.
So, I would go up and adjust the gain on a frequency-by-frequency basis.

Whether I start adjusting the gain based on the VAC+ formula or on the NAL-NL2 formula, the final gain curve is very close.

My conclusion is that whether I choose VAC+ and NAL-NL2, both formulas are the same for me as long as I go to adjust the gain.
Am I right in my opinion?

4.jpg
 
Yes, the bottom line is that regardless of which fitting rationale you choose, you can always alter it to gain curves that's customized to your liking. However, it doesn't always mean that a gain curve of VAC+ that is adjusted to look exactly like the gain curves of NAL-NL2 will make them sound exactly alike. They may sound alike at the exact input level where their curves correspond to, but the formula may give calculated results that may not match 100% in between Soft, Normal and Loud, simply because they don't use the exact calculations in their formula. However, this is only in theory. They may come out close enough anyway to be not noticeable.
 
JHC said:
As I personally understand it: both VAC+, and NAL-NL2, are fitting formulas. The end result of these formulas is Gain.
On the basis of Loud, Moderate, and Soft, at different frequencies, set their respective different gains.

The VAC+ appears to have the additional feature of Soft Speech Booster, which is actually fine-tuning the gain at the appropriate frequency.

According to the attached diagram:
Detail+1, is a 1dB increase between 1.5k-2k for Soft.
Comfort+1, is a 2dB decrease between 125-1.5k for Soft.
Brighter+1, is a 1-2dB increase between 1.5k and greater for Loud, Moderate, and Soft.
Fuller+1, is a 1-2dB decrease between 1.5k and greater for Loud, Moderate, and Soft.

The buttons on the Sound Controls are just convenient adjustments, equivalent to the foolproof buttons.
View attachment 466

If we know this principle, we can artificially change it directly in the gain table, and also achieve the so-called Soft Speech Booster of the VAC+.
Do you agree with this view?
Click to expand...
I have not done any analysis to determine exactly how the Sound Controls adjustments result in what the gain curves would look like. But if you have done enough analysis to lead you to believe in your conclusions above 100%, then OK. But I can't just confirm or deny your conclusion because I don't want to sit down and spend the time to go through the analysis you went through.
 
Wow! Nice images @JHC !!

I would just like to point out (for newbies) that Oticon's Genie 2 has some automation that supposedly will calculate/Rx/Prescribe the correct gain for your hearing loss based on your Personalization-preferences. During the Selection Step you can use the Personalization (in left pane) to describe your preferences for how to handle certain sounds. As an experiment I clicked all the Personalization-preferences on the left and that produced one set of gain handles. And then I repeated the experiment clicking all the Personalization-preferences on the right. The automated Personalization will produce results as shown in the two different gain results below: Yes, I know this is not what you are comparing with your VAC+ and NAL-NL2 comparison. I'm just simply pointing out that some automation does exist based on Personalization-preferences if one chooses to use it.

Yes, even language can influence the calculation/Rx/Prescription. Don't ask me how? I dunno.

c1.jpg


c2a.jpg
c3a.jpg
 
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Volusiano said:
Yes, the bottom line is that regardless of which fitting rationale you choose, you can always alter it to gain curves that's customized to your liking. However, it doesn't always mean that a gain curve of VAC+ that is adjusted to look exactly like the gain curves of NAL-NL2 will make them sound exactly alike. They may sound alike at the exact input level where their curves correspond to, but the formula may give calculated results that may not match 100% in between Soft, Normal and Loud, simply because they don't use the exact calculations in their formula. However, this is only in theory. They may come out close enough anyway to be not noticeable.
Click to expand...
Well, there will be a slight difference, but they're very, very close.
If we wear it long enough, we'll miss the tiny difference.
 
Volusiano said:
I have not done any analysis to determine exactly how the Sound Controls adjustments result in what the gain curves would look like. But if you have done enough analysis to lead you to believe in your conclusions above 100%, then OK. But I can't just confirm or deny your conclusion because I don't want to sit down and spend the time to go through the analysis you went through.
Click to expand...
I understand.
You've given me enough guidance.
 
pvc said:
Wow! Nice images @JHC !!

I would just like to point out (for newbies) that Oticon's Genie 2 has some automation that supposedly will calculate/Rx/Prescribe the correct gain for your hearing loss based on your Personalization-preferences. During the Selection Step you can use the Personalization (in left pane) to describe your preferences for how to handle certain sounds. As an experiment I clicked all the Personalization-preferences on the left and that produced one set of gain handles. And then I repeated the experiment clicking all the Personalization-preferences on the right. The automated Personalization will produce results as shown in the two different gain results below: Yes, I know this is not what you are comparing with your VAC+ and NAL-NL2 comparison. I'm just simply pointing out that some automation does exist based on Personalization-preferences if one chooses to use it.

Yes, even language can influence the calculation/Rx/Prescription. Don't ask me how? I dunno.

View attachment 474


View attachment 471
View attachment 473
Click to expand...
I agree with you.

I'll add to the points:
Even with the same NAL-NL2 formula, different hearing aid manufacturers will optimize (tweak) the gain values generated by the formula according to their ideas.
Just as oticon does, oticon believes that different people have different needs and fine-tunes the gain values generated by the VAC+ formula according to people's needs.

At the end of the day, it only matters if the final gain value is suitable for our needs.
 
JHC said:
At the end of the day, it only matters if the final gain value is suitable for our needs.
Click to expand...
Yep, that's also why we need to do DIY! The adjustments are many and we are the only ones in a position to judge whether the final results are best for our preferences.
 
JHC said:
The VAC+ formula is not perfect enough for me. the NAL-NL2 is also not enough.
So, I would go up and adjust the gain on a frequency-by-frequency basis.

Whether I start adjusting the gain based on the VAC+ formula or on the NAL-NL2 formula, the final gain curve is very close.

My conclusion is that whether I choose VAC+ and NAL-NL2, both formulas are the same for me as long as I go to adjust the gain.
Am I right in my opinion?

View attachment 467
Click to expand...
Really i like to understand them... What they effect on fitting on diagram
 
pvc said:
Yep, that's also why we need to do DIY! The adjustments are many and we are the only ones in a position to judge whether the final results are best for our preferences.
Click to expand...
Yes you are right some times we need little adjustment on fitting
Cuz audiolgist just make a best fit and go
 
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