Concha Labs has been making over-the-counter listening to aids since 2017, advertising only one product—the Concha Sol.
The listening to aids have a well-known design, a basic behind-the-ear configuration with a easy rocker management on the again of every. Concha notably touts its customizability: The Sol are available in your alternative of 4 colours, and might be configured with lead wires in 4 totally different sizes, although it ought to be famous that many competing listening to aids have lead wires that may be adjusted on the fly and changed with bigger or smaller ones.
On the time of your order, Concha works to transform the listening to aids to the dimensions of your ears, pores and skin tone, and the colour of your hair (when you’re fortunate sufficient to have any left), maximizing the probability that they’ll mix in and match correctly. I acquired the gray mannequin with the longest accessible leads and measured the burden of those gadgets at 2.03 grams, which may be very light-weight for behind-the-ear listening to aids.
Replaceable Batteries
The first purpose behind such a lightweight weight is the Sol’s largest draw back: replaceable batteries. That’s a little bit of a nonstarter in right this moment’s listening to help world, and it’s stunning that Concha Labs continues to be clinging to a fading energy mannequin that requires the person to fumble with sliding in a brand new pair of tiny batteries each 5 to 7 days. Whereas replaceable batteries provide a far longer lifespan than even the very best rechargeable cells (in addition to the aforementioned lighter weight), they’re nonetheless a problem that few get pleasure from. (The final analysis I’ve seen, from 2021, confirmed that 70 % of listening to help customers favor rechargeable listening to techniques.)
Assuming you’re OK with a replaceable battery system, the Concha Sol have so much going for them. It begins with tuning. Concha doesn’t use preset sound profiles like most OTC aids. Preset profiles are pretuned frequency waveforms primarily based on hundreds of historic listening to checks folks have taken through the years. These audiograms are averaged, and a handful of consultant audiograms are loaded onto the {hardware}. While you take an in-app listening to take a look at, the app figures out which of those audiograms is closest to yours and masses the suitable corrections into the listening to help {hardware}. It’s not good, however for many customers it’s adequate.
Concha has a built-in listening to take a look at in its app, however it’s wholly not like the standard listening to take a look at, the place you pay attention for pings at totally different frequencies and volumes till a full image of your listening to loss develops. After some preliminary level-setting, Concha’s system, referred to as Soundscope, asks you to pay attention (with every ear) to paired, repeated snippets of speech, then determine whether or not pattern A or pattern B sounds finest. It’s like an eye fixed examination, solely in your ears.