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Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

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Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#31

Post by saidnooneever »

simne wrote: post #13

Amateurs in USSR 50 years ago made wireless and powerless headphones, which use wire lay on perimeter of room to transfer sound and power. In headphones there is tiny coil. It really work and very reliable, but result coil (size of room) have very large reactive resistance, so it is nearly impossible to transfer even high frequencies, only low (bass) and medium, so it workable for speech but music is heavily distorte…

they also made microphones work like this. place em behind the panels of sockets on the wires. some accounts of such devices being found can be found in the book Spy Catchers (by some ex MI5 science officer during cold war). pretty interesting tech!

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#32

Post by onewheeltom »

I use a neck loop plugged into a hearing assist receiver with my hearing aids set to Telecoil. This eliminates having to install a Telecoil in the venue, but they must have a hearing assist system. My experience at church services is that sound is substantially better than using the hearing aids by themselves.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#33

Post by onewheeltom »

dmi wrote: post #5

Hearing aids are at a frustrating crossroads at the moment, IMO. In my experience, a lot of the recent hearing aids don't seem to support induction loops. It often seems to be a choice between that or Bluetooth... and Auracast isn't ready yet. I've had Phonak bilateral hearing aids for 5 years, and Starkey unilateral for ~5 years before that. None of those have supported induction loops.

And unfortunately, Auracast must be installed in the venue or Auracast is useless.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#34

Post by blueflow »

Luc wrote: post #26
hrimfaxi wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has this actually been done before? It sounds fascinating. I have seen accounts of people embedding tiny magnets in their hands but not their ears.

Not embedded, just dropped into your ear canal. I bought it maybe 15 years ago on eBay, so it's nothing new.

Dare to tell what you used it for? Or would you risk loosing some degree or something if you speak about it?

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#35

Post by onewheeltom »

evolve2k wrote: post #2

A 20 year old friend recently had a hearing aid fitted. Despite the aid, audio quality remains crappy in many of the places we gather. Curious around the technology and value of Audio Induction Loops. Would love to hear anyone’s experiences, insights and thoughts on the tech. One of those niche technologies that you don’t use, unless you do use it.

My experience is using a neck loop plugged into the venue’s hearing assist receivers. This eliminates the need to have Telecoil installed in the venue.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#36

Post by AceyMan »

dmi wrote: post #5

Hearing aids are at a frustrating crossroads at the moment, IMO. In my experience, a lot of the recent hearing aids don't seem to support induction loops. It often seems to be a choice between that or Bluetooth... and Auracast isn't ready yet. I've had Phonak bilateral hearing aids for 5 years, and Starkey unilateral for ~5 years before that. None of those have supported induction loops.

I just got my first pair of HAs in November and I opted for the T-coil enabled model. It also (already) has working Auracast (not just "available in a future firmware update" like the other mfgrs). The T-coil model was not much bigger than the one without, and it also had two buttons on each unit rather than one on the T-coil-less model.

411, "Loop systems" are hard-coded in the US's ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) so they are not going away anytime soon. When Auracast does proliferate it'll be alongside loop systems; not a direct replacement. (Not at least until the law is amended and we all know how long that takes.)

--

My HA model is the Starkey Omega 24 RIC-RT (the `mRIC` is the smaller version of the same, sans T-coil).

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#37

Post by jacquesm »

larsmaxfield wrote: post #30
bigfudge wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend who installs loops complains they are largely pointless, because in practice nobody with a hearing aid ever wants to use them. Apparently the quality of a good hearing aid magnifying the audio in the room is substantially better than an induction loop.

No hearing aid magnification comes close if the induction loop is properly installed and integrated with the PA system. With an induction loop it's as if the microphone is directly connected to the hearing aid.

Yes, but you only have the PA on that, not the ambient.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#38

Post by dmi »

y7 wrote: post #10
dmi wrote: post #5

Hearing aids are at a frustrating crossroads at the moment, IMO. In my experience, a lot of the recent hearing aids don't seem to support induction loops. It often seems to be a choice between that or Bluetooth... and Auracast isn't ready yet. I've had Phonak bilateral hearing aids for 5 years, and Starkey unilateral for ~5 years before that. None of those have supported induction loops.

Why is Auracast not ready yet?

It's a chicken-and-egg thing. Not many devices have it, so not many venues install it. Not many venues have it (perhaps because they've invested in other systems), and there's no pressure to change until there are many people wanting to use it.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#39

Post by dmi »

sandworm101 wrote: post #15
dmi wrote: post #5

Hearing aids are at a frustrating crossroads at the moment, IMO. In my experience, a lot of the recent hearing aids don't seem to support induction loops. It often seems to be a choice between that or Bluetooth... and Auracast isn't ready yet. I've had Phonak bilateral hearing aids for 5 years, and Starkey unilateral for ~5 years before that. None of those have supported induction loops.

Also because everyone now carries a computer in thier pocket with a very intelligent microphone and Bluetooth card. Anyone looking at hearing aids afresh today would start with that tech as the backbone.

There are wifi-based systems (like Sennheiser MobileConnect or Williams WAVECast), and my experience has been universally awful. The latency is so high that if you have any ambient hearing you get an echo that makes sound impossible to understand.

If you're ever considering installing one of these systems, please think again. Or at least trial it with a real situation, so you know what the experience will be like for the users.

Re: Anyone have experiences with Audio Induction Loops?

#40

Post by dmi »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #24
dmi wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, it is also possible to get standalone induction receivers that you can plug headphones into, which can be useful for "is this working" checks (for example https://www.ampetronic.com/products/ilr3-audio-induction-loo... ). However you really need someone with hearing aids to tell if it's useful or not. I visit the theatre a lot: ~50 West End visits in 2025, plus several regional venues. It's amazing how many tim…

For the lecture theatre and classrooms at work, we've gone over to IR transmitters and a neckworn loop, which is apparently better for everyone. You can also just use it with IR headphones, which suits certain flavours of neurospicy.

Not a bad option for a lecture theatre, but it's worth noting that IR is line-of-sight and can be easily interrupted by people moving or the receiver twisting as you shift position. Multiple emitters can help with some of this, but there are still challenges.
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