The Harmony Debuts on Advanvced Bionics Website

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Boult

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(Thanks Bob from bhNEWS for head up! )

The Harmony BTE CI Processor from Advanced Bionics has made it's debut on the website!

http://www.bionicear.com/harmony.asp

Learn more about the Harmony and the HiRes Fidelity 120 software here!
 
Cool! If I were to get a CI, I'd choose the Auria Harmony one. The Freedom from Nucleus sounds like it's a great implant too, but Auria is the one I would choose.
 
I'd be torn between these two CIs. (Freedom and Harmony) Did I mention that I come from a very musical family and that one of my sisters is a music teacher? I'm learning toward Freedom for now as you can custom tailor your listening experience. That's important to me as I'm easily distracted by external sounds as well as movement.

If I were one of my sister's kids (I'm the only deaf one in my family), I think I would learn more toward Harmony. But as my dad keeps pointing out to me, I haven't been approved for implant and not to be too disappointed if I get turned down. Still, it doesn't hurt to daydream.

Wow, I get to find out next Monday if I'm a candidate!! :hyper: :hyper:
 
I'm really excited about Advanced Bionics' Fidelity 120. I know several people who were involved in the F120 trials and they can't say enough about how wonderful it is for speech and music!

deafskeptic -- Good luck on Monday!!! :)
 
I'm from a very musical family too... I've always been deaf but had some hearing with a hearing aid. I've been playing guitar for ten years, and I'm still able to tune my guitar but I have the most powerful hearing aid and don't know how long what I have will last. I'm leaning towards getting the Harmony this summer.
 
i would love to get harmony for myself.. as i love to listen to music alots.. so i would get that.. :)
 
With the quality of the newest technology in the freedom or AB, you cannot go wrong with either one.
I did not have time to read the whole AB article. I will have to check it out later, but it seems to be a pretty cool device!
 
I'm not sure, but if I get a 2nd CI done on my other ear, I might go for Advanced Bionics this time. I've heard of a few people having Freedom in one ear and AB in the other, so I know it can be done.
 
When I received my second CI, I thought about being implanted with AB. However, my audi thought it would be best if I remained with Cochlear in order to eliminate having to deal with two separate companies and keeping track of different accessories for each implant. Still, I think it would have been interesting to see how I would have fared with different CI brands in each ear. I also would have liked to find out how music sounds with the HiRes 90K (or F120) versus the Freedom. Having said that, I'm very happy with the choice I've made and if I had to do it all over again, I would in a heartbeat. :)

I know two people who have the Freedom in one ear and the HiRes 90K in the other. One of them prefers her AB CI over the Freedom because the sound is much clearer. The other prefers the Freedom over the 90K.
 
Interesting article! I can see that they are doing this via software which is extremely interesting tidbit for non AB folks like myself (Freedom). Before and after I got my CI, I had discussions with my audi about future developments such as music. She mentioned that Cochlear Inc. is working on providing better sound fidelity in that regard. So, I will be patient and wait for the next upgrade a couple of years down the road :D

Currently, I listen to music alot and I have been very pleased with the results so far (with the Freedom). Any improvements in the software can only make it even better. With competition from AB and Med-El, it is obvious significant improvements and upgrades will always be forthcoming.
 
I agree - Kudos to AB for improving music perception.

Unlike most people here I don't get a choice of which implant to have as Cochlear has 100% the Australian market. However I'm confident that due to the competition provided to Cochlear worldwide by Med-El and AB that Cochlear will continue to work on software improvement that means in the long term we won't miss out and vice versa for people with other brands.

From what I can see priorities are:

Smaller speech processors (eventually no external speech processor!)
Better music perception
Greater reliability
Better battery life

I'd be happy with all that!
 
Hear Again said:
I'm really excited about Advanced Bionics' Fidelity 120. I know several people who were involved in the F120 trials and they can't say enough about how wonderful it is for speech and music!

deafskeptic -- Good luck on Monday!!! :)
Click to expand...

What have you heard about this? I will probably get an implant after the spring semester, and I'd like to hear more about how well people do with 120 channels. My otologist has told me the jury is still out whether or not it would make a big difference. Of course, we'll know for sure in a few months when lots of people start getting it.
 
Franz,

Like your otologist, my audiologist told me the same thing about F120. She also told me that F120 does *not* consist of 120 channels. Instead, it consists of 120 spectral bands. It appears that AB has stopped advertising F120 as being 120 channels. My audi also explained that no more than 12 channels are necessary for a person to be able to understand speech with a CI.

As for what others have experienced with F120, all of them say it's a HUGE improvement over HiResolution. One person reported that they are able to understand music lyrics better now than they could with HiRes. Another person said the sound of F120 is similar to CD quality as opposed to FM sound used by Med-El and Cochlear.

With F120, researchers at AB say that this new programming software allows CI users to hear more frequencies with greater clarity than they can with HiRes and other older strategies.

On the flip side, I've also heard that F120 does not necessarily improve speech discrimination in noise like AB's advertisements claim. Two people I know who participated in the F120 trials told me they didn't notice a significant improvement in their ability to hear in noisy environments. Much of the improvement they noticed was limited to music.

If music is important to you, F120 (and the new Harmony) is something you might want to consider! :)

If you have any other questions about F120, let me know.
 
Hear Again said:
Franz,

Like your otologist, my audiologist told me the same thing about F120. She also told me that F120 does *not* consist of 120 channels. Instead, it consists of 120 spectral bands. It appears that AB has stopped advertising F120 as being 120 channels. My audi also explained that no more than 12 channels are necessary for a person to be able to understand speech with a CI.

As for what others have experienced with F120, all of them say it's a HUGE improvement over HiResolution. One person reported that they are able to understand music lyrics better now than they could with HiRes. Another person said the sound of F120 is similar to CD quality as opposed to FM sound used by Med-El and Cochlear.

With F120, researchers at AB say that this new programming software allows CI users to hear more frequencies with greater clarity than they can with HiRes and other older strategies.

On the flip side, I've also heard that F120 does not necessarily improve speech discrimination in noise like AB's advertisements claim. Two people I know who participated in the F120 trials told me they didn't notice a significant improvement in their ability to hear in noisy environments. Much of the improvement they noticed was limited to music.

If music is important to you, F120 (and the new Harmony) is something you might want to consider! :)

If you have any other questions about F120, let me know.
Click to expand...
Well, they didn't say physicals channel but virtual channels but that was before they didn't give us revealing information. just that there were talk of virtual channels then we learned more details that it is actually spectral bands instead of virtual channels.

In regard to "flip side" in your post; well I am guessing one of those two people you know may be Michael Chorost? because he did say that music and enviromental sound were clearer but not speech but that was a earlier trial. He didn't take another 120 trial again with improvement to see if speech discrimination has improved.

but according to this;
HiResolution Bionic Ear Cochlear Implant System -- with the AURIA BTE

it does say that there improvement in all areas so obviously they tweaked and made it better after his trial. :)

There are some trial that are nearing the end so they are happy with it and can't wait go continue with Harmony and F120. It is matter of programming and tweaking to get what they want.
 
As for what others have experienced with F120, all of them say it's a HUGE improvement over HiResolution. One person reported that they are able to understand music lyrics better now than they could with HiRes. Another person said the sound of F120 is similar to CD quality as opposed to FM sound used by Med-El and Cochlear.

With F120, researchers at AB say that this new programming software allows CI users to hear more frequencies with greater clarity than they can with HiRes and other older strategies.

On the flip side, I've also heard that F120 does not necessarily improve speech discrimination in noise like AB's advertisements claim. Two people I know who participated in the F120 trials told me they didn't notice a significant improvement in their ability to hear in noisy environments. Much of the improvement they noticed was limited to music.

If music is important to you, F120 (and the new Harmony) is something you might want to consider! :)

If you have any other questions about F120, let me know.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for the info. Yes, music is incredibly important to me which is one reason I've been reluctant to get an implant. I'm almost completely deaf and I have a difficult time understanding speech but I can still tune my guitar and tell the difference between all of the tones. My otologist said that I shouldn't expect to enjoy music with an implant, and he said that maybe 1% of people were satisfied with listening to music with an implant. Was he exaggerating? I don't know, but he's at Hopkins and I'm sure he knows what he's talking about.
Honestly, I don't really care that much about hearing in noise. It's got to be better than what I have now, and I'm a good lip-reader. I mean, how much can we expect really? All I really want is to have stable hearing, still be able to enjoy music and to communicate with other people. And I want it to sound natural. I don't like the prospect of hearing everyone's voice being weird and monotone and robotic for the rest of my life. Do people think the 120 sounds more natural?

And here's another question, the type which Boult might be able to answer. I've heard that with the 120 channels the implant will be using 25% of its capacity. I'm curious what might be possible with 80-100% of its capacity. More spectral bands? Faster sampling rates? More definition of sound?
 
Franz K said:
...
My otologist said that I shouldn't expect to enjoy music with an implant, and he said that maybe 1% of people were satisfied with listening to music with an implant. Was he exaggerating? I don't know, but he's at Hopkins and I'm sure he knows what he's talking about.
Click to expand...

I have the Freedom and I'm very happy what I hear listening to music. I know it is not perfect but it is really not bad. It is quite good and I listen to lots of music. As far as tuning a guitar using a piano, well (laughs) it is not easy to do. I know as I tried to do it while with my son. He had to assist me there ;) Even the Harmony probably isn't really going to help as much as one think with hearing every possible note. The phase shifting will certainly help but it still won't be exactly like normal hearing. For one thing, neither the AB or the Cochlear electrodes (virtual or otherwise as it stands right now) is not going to even come close to stimulating the natural ear. Just think trying to stimulate some 30,000 points with 120 virtual ones. Ain't gonna happen...

Franz K said:
Honestly, I don't really care that much about hearing in noise. It's got to be better than what I have now, and I'm a good lip-reader. I mean, how much can we expect really? All I really want is to have stable hearing, still be able to enjoy music and to communicate with other people. And I want it to sound natural. I don't like the prospect of hearing everyone's voice being weird and monotone and robotic for the rest of my life. Do people think the 120 sounds more natural?
Click to expand...

Er...I have all those things and I don't have the harmony. There is nothing weird about what I hear now. It sounds quite natural and normal. I agree that hearing is noise can be problematical but it isn't as bad as some make it out to be. It really depends on your brain not your implant to make sense of it. Some people do better with less and some simply need more. I myself don't have as much trouble as others. But really, the normal thing for hearing or otherwise is to find a quieter place to talk than contend with crazy noises.

Franz K said:
And here's another question, the type which Boult might be able to answer. I've heard that with the 120 channels the implant will be using 25% of its capacity. I'm curious what might be possible with 80-100% of its capacity. More spectral bands? Faster sampling rates? More definition of sound?
Click to expand...

It is not 120 actual but virtual channels just reiterate this to prevent more misunderstandings. All implants are not 100% utilized to capacity because they wanted the ability to allow for better software, algorithms, and improvements to be given to implantees in the future. Who knows what they might be but you can be sure of one thing...it will be better sound quality than one has now.
 
Boult,

Actually, Michael Chorost wasn't one of the people who said they didn't experience much of an improvement in speech discrimination. However, I *have* read Michael Chorost's journal online and am aware that he shared the same opinion.

Irregardless, I'm sure there are many people who are quite happy with the F120 software!

I'm happy to see AB working on future developments to help improve music appreciation. With each company improving technology, all CI users benefit!
 
This has been a disappointing turn of events for AB. The primary focus on the CI regimen always has been, and will continue to be, in speech discrimination. No more, no less. Music appreciation is a marketing concept, at the most, and shouldn't be used as a selling point for a particular CI technology over another.

Let's hope the continually advancing state of CI technology will march onward in improving speech discrimination, despite this little 'marketing' setback.
 
Eyeth,

Although I do my best to be open-minded when it comes to the 3 CI brands, it bothers me a little when people select a CI soley based on music appreciation. I know several people who chose an AB CI for this reason and if truth be told, I don't understand that rationale. To be fair, people are free to make whatever choices they wish and far be it for me to tell them what decision is best for them. Having said that, when I selected a CI, my primary reason for choosing Cochlear had to do with speech discrimination and a company that has been in existence for over 20 years. Others may feel differently and I respect that. However, sometimes I wonder how logical it is to choose a CI based on what one *might* experience when it comes to music appreciation. As we all know, there are *no* guarantees when it comes to speech understanding or music appreciation with a CI. I'd hate to see someone choose AB based on claims regarding improved music appreciation only for them to be disappointed in the end result. Fortunately, I don't know anyone this has happened to (i.e. those who have upgraded from HiRes to F120), so apparently the new F120 technology *does* deliver a higher degree of music enjoyment to its users.
 
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