A year before receiving my first CI, I was wearing Oticon DigiFocus II super power BTEs for a profound loss in my left ear and a severe-profound loss in my right ear. While I thought these aids were wonderful for allowing me to hear environmental sounds, they did not help me understand speech no matter how many adjustments were made and no matter how patient I was. Speech sounded "muddy" and unclear, but for whatever reason I could hear environmental sounds quite well with these aids -- in fact, much better than I could with my analog Oticon 380P BTEs. After a year of frustration and no luck in finding a programming setting which would enable me to hear and understand speech, I finally gave up and went back to using my 15 year old Oticons until the time I received my first CI. That being said, I know there are many people for whom digital aids work great -- I just wasn't one of them. 
