Difficulty hearing vocals

[Calvert]

The quest for a near perfect solution continues. I fully realize that in my case perfection may not be realistic.

 

[herbu]

My short term memory loss hinders me in situations like this. I was shown audiogram charts but do not recall the details.

Calvert, sorry to hear this, but don't worry too much. I routinely forget what TLS says right after I read it.

 

[KEW]

The quest for a near perfect solution continues. I fully realize that in my case perfection may not be realistic.

Perfection, itself, is overrated... the quest for perfection, however, is very much a worthwhile activity!

 

[TLS Guy]

You are more than kind TLS. My primary damage is to my brain. I have frontal lobe disorder and complex partial seizure disorder. My short term memory loss hinders me in situations like this. I was shown audiogram charts but do not recall the details. Since I have a hearing checkup scheduled for Tuesday and ask for further data.

I'm sorry to hear that.

In that case it is possible you have some cortical problems as well as noise induced high frequency loss.

The cortical connections involving hearing are complex and poorly understood. Recent research shows surprisingly widespread cortical connections involving hearing. There are indeed more recent reports of hearing problems involving the cortex and including the frontal lobes. These issue involve word understanding issues of a complex and varied nature. Interestingly these types of problems have an association with partial seizures. This whole area is evolving.

Hearing aids will obviously help with the nerve deafness, but not more higher brain issues, in the brain stem mid brain or cortex.

In any event as far as audio is concerned you might well benefit from a change of speakers, especially the center.

A center that has a much more optimal polar response would very likely help you. In addition mounting the center above rather than below the TV would likely also help you.

This center would be your best choice in my view.

A coaxial driver properly set up and correctly placed in my view allows for the best speech discrimination. Most centers are a problem. I know a lot hear refuse to believe that. An awful lot of centers, may be even most are worse than useless.

 

[KEW]

I'm sorry to hear that.

In that case it is possible you have some cortical problems as well as noise induced high frequency loss.

The cortical connections involving hearing are complex and poorly understood. Recent research shows surprisingly widespread cortical connections involving hearing. There are indeed more recent reports of hearing problems involving the cortex and including the frontal lobes. These issue involve word understanding issues of a complex and varied nature. Interestingly these types of problems have an association with partial seizures. This whole area is evolving.

Hearing aids will obviously help with the nerve deafness, but not more higher brain issues, in the brain stem mid brain or cortex.

In any event as far as audio is concerned you might well benefit from a change of speakers, especially the center.

A center that has a much more optimal polar response would very likely help you. In addition mounting the center above rather than below the TV would likely also help you.

This center would be your best choice in my view.

A coaxial driver properly set up and correctly placed in my view allows for the best speech discrimination. Most centers are a problem. I know a lot hear refuse to believe that. An awful lot of centers, may be even most are worse than useless.

Damn, Dr. Mark, you just know too much about too much!!!

 

[DukeL]

Researcher David Greisinger distinguishes between speech intelligibility and speech comprehension. The difference is, if we can make out the words but have to focus our attention on our hearing to do so, we don't have enough brain power left over to fully comprehend and remember the ideas the speech is conveying. So ideally we'd like to go beyond the ability to understand the words and get to the place where we understand the words effortlessly and can therefore focus our attention on the ideas they are conveying. (The acoustics in many classrooms are so poor that students who are not near the front of the room can barely understand the words and cannot follow and remember complex ideas that are being taught. Wish I had known this fifty years ago.)

Griesinger believes the direct sound must be well differentiated from the reverberant sound in order for good comprehension to occur, making this observation:

"The earlier a reflection arrives the more it contributes to masking the direct sound."

One implication of this principle is that a highly directional loudspeaker would be desirable from a speech comprehension standpoint, as this would 1) minimize the early reflections, and 2) maximize the direct-to-reverberant sound ratio. Another implication is that some care in positioning and aiming of the speaker(s), and some use of absorption at first-reflection points, might well be worthwhile.

Others here are probably better qualified than I am to make specific center channel speaker recommendations, but in Calvert's case, I believe aggressive radiation pattern control should be a high priority. Assuming the pattern control results in fairly smooth and rapid fall-off in the off-axis response, Calvert could aim the speaker at himself and it would be a little bit less loud for his wife who would be sitting off-axis.

If tasked with designing such a center channel, I'd probably use a large prosound coaxial driver. Perhaps there's something like this already out there at a reasonable price.

 

[Calvert]

I'm sorry to hear that.

In that case it is possible you have some cortical problems as well as noise induced high frequency loss.

The cortical connections involving hearing are complex and poorly understood. Recent research shows surprisingly widespread cortical connections involving hearing. There are indeed more recent reports of hearing problems involving the cortex and including the frontal lobes. These issue involve word understanding issues of a complex and varied nature. Interestingly these types of problems have an association with partial seizures. This whole area is evolving.

Hearing aids will obviously help with the nerve deafness, but not more higher brain issues, in the brain stem mid brain or cortex.

In any event as far as audio is concerned you might well benefit from a change of speakers, especially the center.

A center that has a much more optimal polar response would very likely help you. In addition mounting the center above rather than below the TV would likely also help you.

This center would be your best choice in my view.

A coaxial driver properly set up and correctly placed in my view allows for the best speech discrimination. Most centers are a problem. I know a lot hear refuse to believe that. An awful lot of centers, may be even most are worse than useless.

A recommendation please.

 

[TLS Guy]

A recommendation please.

I did recommend one in the hyperlink in my last post.

Here is the link.

http://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/item/kefq200cblk/kef-q200c-q-series-5.25-center-channel-speaker-black/1.html?gclid=CjwKEAiA3_axBRD5qKDc__XdqQ0SJAC6lecAzRJqX0pC4-Iq0pMJYCiDz89W1ITdPTWCVrrSK-ISkRoCdWfw_wcB

It is the KEF Q200C.

 

[pjviitas]

If you have hearing problems stick with the best set of stereo speakers you can afford.

 

[TLS Guy]

If you have hearing problems stick with the best set of stereo speakers you can afford.

Yes, and no. A good center should not make speech clarity and discrimination worse. I know they so often do.

However a center has the advantage of being able to increase the volume of dialog with respect to everything else.

 

[highfigh]

If the hearing variations are consistent, I think I would avoid using Audyssey and become familiar with setting it manually because auto-correction systems are trying to achieve one thing and you need something that's totally different. If the room has hard surfaces between you and the speakers, this would usually mean that Audyssey will reduce the level of the mid-range and that's right where most of the energy in human speech lives. If most of the frequency response works for you, you can go into Audyssey and see the changes to the equalization- write the settings down and go into Manual Setup, Audio Settings and look for the equalizer. Adjust the mid-range so you can hear dialogue better and if others can live with it, great, and if not, tweak it until it works.

Depending on the model of AV receiver, it may have personal settings for different users. I would save one set for the times when others are watching and the equalization compromises work and then, save another just for yourself, so it sounds best to you.

 

[Calvert]

Due to other priorities we will be sticking with our current equipment listed below and we will not be upgrading our Infinity Alphas for the same reason. I think we have found a setup that works well with my new, improved tech hearing aids.

Thanks to everyone. Sometimes life sneaks up and changes all your plans.