Time to Read: 12 Minutes
Phonak's Audeo Marvel M-RT hearing aid is a wonder of connectivity.
It comes in 4 models: Audeo M30-RT , Audeo M50-RT , Audeo M70-RT and the most versatile of the bunch, the Phonak Audeo M90-RT. This video reviews the Audeo M-RT and compares it to other models of Marvel hearing aids.
Value Hearing founder Christo Fourie reviews the Marvel RT in this video or read the transcript below:
Hi my name is Christo Fourie. I'm an audiologist and the author of the Hearing Aid Buyer's Guide for the Self-funded Australian.
Today I'd like to discuss with you the Phonak Audeo MRT hearing aid. It's a hearing aid we've been waiting for for over a year since the Marvel was first released. They mentioned it's coming and we finally have some to put on people to use.
I'm wearing one today and I'd like to show you the features and the benefits of this particular model. Phonak Marvel has been a fantastic hearing aid, well-received in the marketplace primarily because it's a true Bluetooth hearing aid.
Uses real Bluetooth
It doesn't use Bluetooth Low Energy like your Made for iPhone hearing aids do. It actually uses real Bluetooth but the trick was that Phonak or Sonova, the company who makes the Marvel, was able to reduce the power requirements for Bluetooth and bring it in into a hearing aid at a very small size.
What that means in real terms is you can connect this hearing aid to pretty much any Bluetooth device and use it as a headset.
It also has the ability to do hands-free mobile phone calling and all of this happens in stereo if you wear a pair of hearing aids. So the new MRT is based on this wonderful Marvel platform the RT references it's recharge ability as well as the fact that it has a built-in telecoil.
The convenience of rechargeable
Up to now we've only had battery driven hearing aids in the Marvel range that had telecoil and those were released earlier in 2019. This is the first time we've got a rechargeable hearing aid from Phonak using lithium ion batteries that also has the telecoil in a receiver-in-the- canal style hearing aid.
The fact that this hearing aid is rechargeable and telecoil and has the Marvel platform in it means it's one of the most capable hearing aids that Sonova ever released so the Marvel RT is probably one of the most versatile hearing aids on the market today.
It's able to connect a wide variety of devices including Android and iPhone devices, Windows phones - pretty much any Bluetooth phone that's more recent than 2010. The only exception seems to be Motorola which has a few issues.
On top of that it can also connect to a Roger Direct and I've discussed the Roger Select which is essentially a little tool which allows you to hear better background noise in another video, and it also allows it to connect to voicestream technology which is Phonak's proprietary technology for connecting in stereo to a television transmitter or a remote microphone so extremely versatile. But the addition of the telecoil also allows it to connect to public loop systems or even the phone loop that you might find in a handheld phone as long as the phone is compatible. You'll be able to hold the phone up to the hearing aid and get streaming directly into your ear.
This hearing aid has a wide range of connectivity options and I can't think of a single other aid that has all of this included in a rechargeable hearing aid, which is why the Marvel RT is such an exciting development well like Marvel's been one of the best received hearing aids I've ever had the pleasure to work with.
Very versatile and easy to work with
It's a very versatile, very easy to adjust, hearing aid; has fantastic initial user acceptance as long as you use real ear measurements to fit it. And it comes in a variety of levels so the RT model isn't only reserved for your top-end hearing aids you can get it right down from the 30 level, at the 50 level, 70 level. In the 90 level which is the premium - the 90 by far is the most versatile and the best performing in background noise.
Just because the Audeo M90 RT is the most versatile and the best performing in noise, doesn't mean that everyone requires that hearing aid.
A lot of pros to this device is the convenience of a lithium ion rechargeable battery. Each charge of the batteries should give you about 18 hours worth of use, so for most users that's more than enough.
It's only extreme users which might still want to use a battery version just for that bit of extra reliability, so the battery doesn't switch off on you but looking at our data logging figures, most users use their hearing aids up to about 16 hours. So if you're in the majority of people using hearing aids, the 18 hours is more than enough to cover you.
That Battery life is rated at 6 years. So essentially, the battery built into the hearing aid should last you six years before it needs replacing and that's something that can be replaced during repairs. It's not a hearing aid you need to throw away.
Choice of two rechargeable options
The MRT also comes with two rechargeable options. As far as your casing or your charger itself, you've got the little mini charger which houses the hearing aids in there and it's nice and closable and easy to pocket so it's a great little option that doesn't take up much space.
If you do want a bit more versatility, you've also got the option of a combi charger.
It's a larger charger but it allows for use of a silica desiccant tablet in here which can dry out the hearing aids and you can pair to this package, the rechargeable power pack which is optional, and essentially just slots in the bottom, locks, and this itself contains a battery allowing for about three charges away from the powerpoints.
They are great for those traveling or camping quite often it is an extra on the combi you can choose when you order your hearing aids whether you want the mini charger, which is the standard one, or the combi charger. Then you can buy an alternative if you wanted to.
All our our pricing actually includes a charger of your choice
If I had to nit-pick for a drawback on the MRT it would be its size. It’s fractionally larger than the MR which is the rechargeable without telecoil but talking only a couple of millimetres so these hearing aids in here are the MR they reasonably discreet but on my ear I've got the MRT.
Only two small drawbacks
So if you compare the two directly and hold them together you can see that the R, which is the front one, is slightly smaller than the RT - about two millimetres - and that's quite understandable because the telecoil which is built into the MRT is literally a little magnetic coil loop about two millimetres long and about a millimetre high or so and it's got a coil wrapped around it so it does take up a little bit more space to have that built into the hearing aid.
The other drawback with most Marvels with telecoil is they seem to have lost the ability to use Auto Phone. In the past with Auto Phone there was a little switch in the hearing aid. As soon as you bring the phone up to the switch it closes the switch and it engages the phone mode.
With these that settings just doesn't seem to be available in the software hopefully that's something that they can reintroduce but there might be some technical limitations with the Bluetooth as to why they didn't bring it into this model, but that's easily solved by just pushing a button when you answer the phone and the hearing aid will go to the phone mode and put the sound in both ears for you.
The size is pretty much the most limiting factor and if you compare the RT to the R, yes there's a size difference but compare it to the smallest Marvel which is the 312 you can see that's quite discreet and small, where the RT which is on the extreme other side of the scale - both thicker and quite a bit longer than the 312 battery so if you're very very concerned with size that might be an issue, but again you've got the smaller three one two battery available to you.
The RT also comes in all the standard Phonak colours which is essentially designed to match your hair. When you pick a colour I recommend finding something slightly darker than your hair, because one does expect a shadow behind the ear, and we can order it in any one of those colours so quite a variety of options available to you.
Finally Phonak has rolled out the entire Audeo Marvel range would expect some over the ear with normal tubing to come out, but as far as receiver-in-the canal devices, if size is not your main concern, this is a fantastically capable device which should not let you down as long as you selected the right level and you've got appropriate expectations for hearing in noise which you can only achieve if you've had a speech-in-noise test done.
So make sure you get your speech-in-noise test done before considering a device like this, or any other device, and I'm sure we will see plenty of happy clients using the MRT as we have the other Marvel models.
