TV optical headphones

[Andrew]

Sony Handy Speaker ?. £129 in J-L.

[T i m]

<snip>

If these do really need to cater for someone specifically (but not exceptionally) hard_of_hearing, I believe my mate got some for his MIL (he bought them for her, not swapped them for her <g>) and apparently they were very well received. I can find out what if you like but I don't think they were 'cheap' (if this is only a experiment)?

Cheers, T i m

[Andrew]

Even more reason for you to investigate the Sony Handy Speaker. Purpose made for TV viewers who need their own personal audio levels that might conflict with anyone else watching.

[David Paste]

Sony WH-CH510, £40 from John Lewis, Argos, etc. Absolutely brilliant. Comfortable for hours at a time, battery lasts for

35 hours on a charge, comes with appropriate USB-C charging cable. You can get them in black, blue, or white if that is important to you. I got white, although they are a very pale blue/grey in reality and they set off my sartorial grace beautifully.

I use mine for keeping my mind occupied on long walk where they work very well indeed to block out road noise even though they aren't noise-cancelling. They are the "on-ear" type where padded ear cups press on the ear (rather than "over ear" which are larger and envelope the ear completely, or those "ear buds" which you cram right down the lug'ole and give you the ability to develop infections). I tried many different headphones at the displays in a few different shops and by far these were the best. Other headphones in the price range either had notably poorer sound quality, headbands which were too tight or too loose, or a combination thereof.

[whisky-dave]

Ypu can also use a fibre optic cable to connect to such things, I'm using one to connect the TV to my soundbar

Perhaps the confusion is wireless, bluetooth and optical. I know it's possible to use an optical link with is also wireless. But an optical link like this usually uses a 'lead' which is a fibre optic cable so can't really be referred to as wireless even though the fibre is not really a wire in the normal sense of the word.

Only if the optical is using an infra red link.

[Tim Lamb]

In message [e-mail], Thomas Prufer [e-mail]> writes

I'm holding off hearing aids. Very little of what I do requires good hearing and it doesn't hurt her to shout a little (or enunciate clearly as requested).

[Tim Lamb]

In message [e-mail], T i m [e-mail]> writes

Our respective bedrooms are vertically separated:-)

If I have my TV volume set to overcome my hearing deficiencies, the adverts are then a bit loud. I was thinking earphones would be a way out particularly if the upper frequencies could be tweaked a bit.

[Tim Lamb]

Now someone has pointed out the bluetooth option, the discussion has moved to suitable headphones. £50 budget.

[Thomas Prufer]

Errrr -- the adverts are always louder, curse them. And where they aren't allowed to be, they are made more noticeable acoustically. Making the less loud bits louder, and other tricks to make the ads stand out.

Headphones with a volume knob or a mute button on the headset itself would help with this, maybe?

Thomas Prufer

[charles]

good hearing aids do more than increase the basic level. They can be frequency selective in the amount of amplification they provide. I get a

30db boost at around 3kHz.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Problem I can see is they are still going to need their battery charging. Which means returning them to a charging point of some sort. So no real advantage over any type of cordless headphones. But may well have a degree of latency other types won't have.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

I doubt you'd find the ads in the middle of The Voice or similar louder than the prog. ;-)

The only way to make sure ads ain't louder would be to audition every single ad break and set the levels for that. Which is never going to happen - and never has.

And those paying for the ads, and therefore the prog you are watching wouldn't be happy if it was quieter than it.

[whisky-dave]

No they aren;t apparently well the absolute volume isnl;t increased but the compression ratio is change so the averafge amplitude is raised, because there;s few if any low volumes such as whipsering in an add, and there;s few if any explosions so the auto level rises. Well that is what I was told by a sound engineer.

Yeah that still appl.ies and I still have to mute them .

Yep, that's what the advertisers pay for so I can hear their ads while I'm walking out to make a cup of tea in the ad break.

[Brian Reay]

The Amazon Choice ones I mentioned have a claimed run time on batteries of

100 hrs.

As for the ?lag?, in the past I found you soon learned to ignore it.

The beauty of wireless is you can move around without getting straggled - even pop to the loo or to make tea / coffee- without thinking about it.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Actually, the peak level allowed on ITV is actually 4 dB lower than peak programme level. Or was at one time. Doubt the likes of CH5 etc complies with that though.

But any signal processing in the broadcast chain isn't altered between prog and ads. More the way the ads are made. If you think about it, they'll use a nice high quality mic for the speech good and close. And choose the voice which is clearest. Unlike most of TV where they use nasty personal mics.

[whisky-dave]

Yes it's very handy, I do this with my iphone/ipad and the airpods, and if I do go out of range and the signal stops my idevice also stops at that point so when I return I can press play again. Or if I've only just been 'cut-off' by retracing my steps I find that the 'track' has been paused for a short time and will continue where it left off, but this is only if it;s cut off for a few seconds. But I've only noticed this with podcasts, because as I don't normally listen to music with airpods so there is a chance I have missed a word or two but didn't notice.

I don't think this works with headphones listening to the TV or radio.

[Brian Reay]

Current wireless headphones are on 863MHz (or whatever frequency around there is allocated for such things) and the range is better that Bluetooth. It does depend on the path but I?ve even tried it down the garden- just to see if it works. However, the tx end is a bit large.

I bought a BT tx off eBay a week or so back to try something- linking the audio from the TV in the motorhome ( the TV doesn?t have BT built in) to the audio system ( which has BT). It worked perfectly. The plan is to alsouse the BT tx on the audio output of the satellite Rx so I can feed radio audio to the MH system when in Europe- then we can hear R4 and Classic FM.

I then thought I?d try a set of BT headphones but I?ve not ordered them yet.

[whisky-dave]

My dad had a pair of 'wireless' headphones called TV ears the base unit connected to the TV via the headphone jack, this unit used IR to send the signal the the headphones. Not really what we'd call wireless aka bluetooth or the MHz range, but they worked well enough.

I guess yuo could call them optical too.