On 7/10/2011 10:46 AM, Edward R. Cole wrote: > I have followed the critiques on the reflector for headset-boom mics > but have not bought any. Mostly the reports are on audio performance > and not comfort.
Hi Ed, The Yamaha CM500 is quite comfortable. In the 18 months so that I've owned mine, it's become my only radio headset, and I often do weekend contests that keep me in the chair for 15-20 hours (and sometimes as long as 30 hours) in a weekend. The large Sony phones (MDR7506 and the consumer MDR equivalent) are also quite comfortable. Some thoughts about using headphones WITHIOUT your hearing aids in place. The condition you've described of very strong loss of hearing above 500-1,000 Hz is characteristic of the vast majority of people with enough hearing loss to use (or need) a hearing aid, but the details of the response shape varies greatly depending on many factors, including the noise to which the victim has been exposed over the years, and various medical/physical factors. A good hearing aid will include equalization customized to the hearing loss of each ear to try to restore something approaching "normal hearing." The RXEQ section of the K3's signal processing can take a major step in this direction. A hearing impaired user should set the lower four frequency bands to their lowest settings and boost the top two bands. Since ham communications, by their nature, have limited audio bandwidth, there's no benefit from boosting frequencies higher than 4kHz. One thing I WOULD strongly suggest, if it's practical, is for Elecraft to add an optional DSP setting for hearing impaired individuals that would do some simple but strong low-cut and some general contouring of the spectrum above 500 Hz. In general, the biggest single thing we can do to improve speech intelligibility is to minimize the bass content (below about 350-400 Hz) so that these sounds, which do NOT contribute to speech intelligibility, don't waste audio power that can be used for the higher frequency sounds that DO carry intelligibility. 73, Jim K9YC ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
