Signia Pure Charge&Go vs. Signia Silk
What's up, folks? My name is Nick and welcome back to another product review for ZipHearing. We got a little something different for you today. That's right. We got a battle of the boxes. We got two different kinds of hearing aids, both from Signia. We're going to tell you what's great, what's not so great, and hopefully fill you in on the details, the nitty gritty and give you a little bit more information to make a decision. ZipHearing recently sent out two pairs of hearing aids for me to try out. They sent them to my audiologist and that's what we're going to review today. If you don't know what ZipHearing is, essentially it's a way for you to get all the name brand hearing aids at thousands of dollars below retail with local care included. And you can click here to learn more because this video is a comparison video we're going to be talking about a lot of stuff. So there are chapters below, so feel free to peruse the chapters or watch the whole video for the full comparison, but we're going to kind of chop it up into bite size pieces so you can click around and really kind of focus on what you're more interested in. So check out the chapters below. So just a little bit of background about me and my hearing loss. I do have very mild hearing loss. It is sensorineural and I was suggested to check out some hearing aids.
So I did. Right. I went to my audiologist, I had a fitting, I had a consultation. They told me how much they wanted and I just about died. So I went on this quest to find a better option in terms of pricing. And that is where I landed on ZipHearing. And I promise you this is no exaggeration. I literally saved thousands of dollars compared to what my audiologist wanted to charge me. So I decided I was going to become a ZipHearing customer. And I still am. I am a ZipHearing customer. I purchased my Phonak Lumity 90s through ZipHearing and did a little bit of review work and they were actually so pleased with the outcome that they invited me to do more reviews. So that's why we have two of these Signia hearing aids to check out today. One of these is going to be a receiver in canal style hearing aid and the other one is going to be a completely in canal style hearing aid. The receiver in canal hearing aid we have for you today is the Signia Pure Charge and Go 7ax which is their top of the line super duper most premium model. The completely in canal type hearing aid we have for you today is actually the Signia Silk 7 X, which is also their super duper top of the line premium model. So we're going to start by diving into the receiver in canal model, which is the Pure Charge&Go.
What do you get in this box? I assure you it's more than the nothing that is currently in there. You're going to get a bag which is rolled up nice. You know, your provider is going to give this to you. You're going to get a little microfiber, pretty cool, clean it, do fun stuff. You're going to get a little cleaning tool. It's a brush, get a little brush with a little tool on the end to help clean your hearing aids, which you should be doing. Make sure you clean your hearing aids. Very important. You're going to get a standard charger keeping them charged because they are rechargeable. These do not take batteries like the other ones we're going to look at. These are built in batteries. You charge them with this pretty nifty little thing. You're also going to get one of these really cool carrying cases. I mean, come on, this thing looks super cool. And finally, you're also going to get the most important part, which is the hearing aids themselves. So let's kind of take a look at what these hearing aids look like. Nice. Sort of nice looking, right? Nothing too unfamiliar. You can see the receiver wire sort of comes out a little bit lower on the horn. It's actually really comfortable. I didn't expect it to feel any different, but it kind of does, right? It kind of lightens up the hearing aids, makes them feel less heavy, doesn't make them feel like they're sitting on your ear.
It's kind of just like part of your vibe for the day, which is super cool. We're going to talk about this later, but here are the domes. Now your domes may be different than my domes because these hearing aids work for a variety of hearing loss. That's right. These hearing aids are rated for anywhere from mild to severe hearing loss. So the variety of domes is going to depend directly upon your level of hearing loss and what works best for your ears and your hearing situation. So here's some stats, here's some fun stuff. The pure charge and go comes in five different technology levels. You have the 1 ax, the 2 ax, the 3ax and the 5ax and the 7ax. Obviously, the higher the number, the more premium the technology level and the higher the cost. These hearing aids come in a variety of different colors. There are ten different colors for you to choose from. You could choose the color based off of the color of your hair, the color of your skin, which whatever one is your favorite color as usual. Right? I got mine in graphite gray because I like graphite gray. I like charcoal. I like that gunmetal color. It's my favorite color. In terms of tech specs, right, these do utilize a Bluetooth connection and it is the MFI or made for iPhone standard.
Just because it is the made for iPhone standard does not mean you cannot use it with an Android device. There is a list of fully compatible Android devices. Furthermore, there is an augmented xperience that's an x no ex just xperience platform. The new ax platform is supposed to increase battery life, be more efficient, increase speech, clarity in noise, and furthermore, it has updated the physical design and appearance and ergonomics of the hearing aids. There's also a really cool little feature which is compatible with some of their more premium accessories, which we'll get into later. But it is Qi Qi. I don't know how you say it. Qi wireless compatible, which means that on their premium charging cases you don't even need a cable. You can just plop it down on a charging mat and it'll charge the pure charge and go. For pricing, AX comes in five different technology levels. And yes, they're all different pricing. So please click that link again, go check it out. But essentially you're looking at anywhere from $2600 to about $4,500 for the pair depending on the technology level. So what do I personally think about these r i c or receiver in canal hearing aids from signia the pure charge and go. Let's start with the pros. Right. I'm going to give you my experience. This is what I think, your opinion could be different. I try to remain as neutral as possible and just kind of give you what's good, what's not so good.
So let's start with the good. These were the most natural sounding hearing aids I have tried so far and I have tried I think we're up to five, six, six different hearing aids. And immediately this was kind of just like hearing plus. Right. It was like your hearing plus the support of the hearing aids. It wasn't like it was adding more. Highs or lows or kind of giving these unnatural wind tunnel effect or white noise. They just sounded so natural. And that was like super refreshing because, you know, upon placing them in my ears, I was kind of expecting it to sound like a hearing aid, but it really didn't. It just it sounded like what my hearing should be like just better. Another really cool thing was the ease of setup, right? You connect these to your iPhone. I'm an iPhone user, so everything I'm going to say is iPhone. You connect these to your iPhone through accessibility and it just works, right? Everything gets set up with the Bluetooth. Mfi Standard streaming is cool. Having audio come from your phone, everything worked flawlessly. The app, which plays a pretty big part in the user experience, was also really easy to use, I think. And you know, again, I'm going to say this a little bit, I'm going to say this a couple times. We're going to talk about this later.
The app could use a little bit of work, but overall, very good experience with the app, very user friendly, not clunky. It was yeah, overall, very positive experience with the app, the button placement on the devices themselves, really they're in a great spot. You know, they're not super high up on the device. They're kind of more in the back. I thought the button placement was fantastic and the actual buttons themselves are clicky and responsive and not too hard to press, but also not too easy, which is a delicate line to walk. So signia thumbs up. You did a good job. The overall comfort, right? How are they on long days of use, right. Are they comfortable? Do you feel them? Are they annoying? Good news. You don't even feel them, right? They're just kind of there. They don't take up too much space. They don't have any hot points where like, it pokes into you or it rubs you the wrong way. You just kind of put them on and you forget they're there. And that's, you know, after I wear my hearing aids all day, I go, you know, 10 to 13 hours a day of hearing aid use. So being able to say that throughout that entirety of the day, I didn't feel them. That says a lot. Speaking of wearing them for long days, the battery life. The battery life is fantastic, right? I did not ever once have to worry about, oh man, am I running out of battery because I didn't, right? The battery life is fantastic.
The efficiency on the hearing aids is fantastic thanks to that platform. So battery life gets you all day and then some. Another plus is these domes, right? I showed you them earlier, but I'm going to show you again. Look at these domes. These domes are an amazing shape, right? They just kind of sit in your ear canal. They take up just the right amount of space. They're grippy, but they're soft. They don't move. They don't budge.These are probably my favorite domes on any hearing aid device ever. As I mentioned earlier, these do come with a case, Right. This is another pro. I mean, come on, these coming with a case that's great. And there's a ton of room. I almost dropped it, but I didn't. There's a ton of room in there. Right. So if you have the receiver in canal, maybe with a custom dome or a seashell or some sort of other type of fitting other than just a standard dome, you're going to have a ton of room in here and there's a little bubble there to keep everything secure. This is a great case getting into the special features, right, And kind of relating to the app that we mentioned earlier. There are a few things in this app. There are a few technical features on these devices that I am in love with.
The first one is the directional audio control. Oh my gosh, I thought it was a gimmick. It is not. You literally go into I'm going to show you some screenshots, so hopefully it explains what you're seeing on the screenshots. You can click the directional audio. Where is this audio source coming from? And you can focus your hearing aids in that direction. So if you are in a little bit of a noisy environment and you want to focus on the person in front of you, open your app, click the direction in front of you, boom, done. If you're in the car and you're driving and you got some wind noise or you got some music and the passenger is chatting and you can't really hear them, boop, go in the app, turn the direction that way. Now you have a superior level of audio source coming into those hearing aids and pumping it into your ears. It's wonderful. What is kind of becoming more standard now is there's also a health tracking feature, right? Steps, calories, health, general health, that kind of thing. I am not a huge user of that because I have an Apple Watch. I go through my watch for that. But if you do not have a fitness or health watch, you can use these to track steps and see general health. One of my favorite things. Oh my gosh. Mask mode. There is a button you can press in the app that will help with masks.
Right? We've all I mean, I don't know if we've all but I've definitely had that issue where I cannot hear the person talking. So normally I depend on lip reading, but if you're wearing a mask, I can't see their lips, so I'm just kind of in a heap of trouble. By clicking mask mode. It enhances the speech frequency that comes through the mask and increases the volume of the person talking to you through the mask. This is genius and it is effective. I have tested it. I have tried it. It worked wonders. Great job, Signia. As always, not everything is sunshine and rainbows and fantastic. Let's talk about a couple of the bad things. The first and I mentioned this earlier, is the app needs just a tiny bit of work. And I'm not saying the way it functions, I'm just saying the way it looks. It tends to utilize symbols rather than words, which is beneficial in some ways, but detrimental in others. I prefer a combination of the two use symbols and use words. It's also kind of basic looking. It doesn't really feel or seem super polished. I mean, it doesn't seem bad. It's just in comparison to other apps. It leaves you wondering why they didn't take that one more step. But again, it's not bad. It's not a bad experience. I just think the way it looks is like an eight out of ten. I think if you know a little bit more Polish and a little bit more spit shine, right, get that to a ten out of ten. There was a little bit of a weird noise that would happen. Semi-frequently I would say, you know, anywhere from 10 to 15 times a day. And I think if I if I'm understanding this correct, it is actually the way that the artificial intelligence or the AI platform is working. You can kind of hear it almost sounds like glass clinking, right? It's like that high pitched sort of ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Right. It doesn't last very long. Right? Less than a second. And it is quiet. So you may or may not hear it, but I was able to hear it. It wasn't super annoying. And it wasn't it didn't shatter my attention to anything. I just. Oh, there's that noise again. I think it's just something you will get used to and live with. And again, like I said, it's not extremely intrusive. You have to really kind of be searching for it. You have to be waiting for it and then it shows up. Otherwise you would probably just ignore it. I'm crazy. So don't don't take that to heart. Streaming audio, right? Music, movies, videos, Facebook, Instagram, whatever. It works. It's pretty flawless, pretty seamless.
The quality of the music not great. And again, that's just a hearing aid thing with standard of receivers. That low end is not really going to be there. And so it's going to sound tinny and harsh. There are ways around it. Different companies make different kinds of receivers, there's different fittings, there's different molds, there's different domes. So if that is a concern for you, talk about it with your hearing professional and hopefully you guys can work it out. One more con and this is easily remedied by extra accessories that you can purchase the charger. It's okay. Um, those of you that know me, you guys know that I like a charger with a lid. And guess what? This doesn't have this. This basic charger that comes with it does not have a lid, right? You just have your two openings for your hearing aids. It's kind of small. It does come with a wall brick. It is a USB connection. But here's another thing that if you know me, you know, I don't like this cable. Is not detachable from the charger. So if you have a dog or a cat or a small child who likes to chew on wires, this if they chew on this, this is bye bye. The whole thing, right? You got to get a whole new one. Or you can upgrade to a premium accessory, which we're going to talk about right now.
So as I go through these, I'm going to put up some pictures and show you what they look like. And then I actually have one accessory here in the flesh. I can hold it. I can touch it. I can show you it, and I can tell you all about it. So first there is the pure portable charger. This is the solution to the standard charger. This has a lid, this has a detachable cable. This also has Qi, Qi Qi, however you say it, this has wireless charging so you can place it on that wireless charging pad you've got maybe for your phone or maybe for another device and the need for a cable goes out the window entirely. Not only that, this thing holds a charge so you can charge it fully, put your hearing aids in it, take them out, and you don't need to charge it again because it holds a charge. It's got a battery built in. That's super cool. I would 100% splurge and get one of those. There's also the pure dry and clean charger. Now, this one is Usb-c cable compatible. It's not it doesn't hold a charge, so you can't really take it with you. It's meant to be stationary and it is meant to both charge clean and dry your hearing aids. So keeping them clean very important and keeping them dry even more important. So if this is something that interests you, this is available.
There's the streamline mic, right? This is a little microphone accessory that can be worn by someone and their audio goes into the microphone and gets pumped into your ears via Bluetooth. Super cool. There's also the mini pocket, which is a small remote for the hearing aids, up, down, Volume Presets, whatever. You probably don't need this because you've got the app on your phone and you've got the buttons on the hearing aids. So I mean, that's a thing. And finally, we have the streamline TV device. This is the one that I told you I have. It's in my hands and I really like it. And let me tell you why. First of all, the setup, right? My audiologist helped me with this. I don't think he had to. It's pretty easy to set up, right? You plug it in, you press that red setup button and it pretty much just works. This is powered by a micro USB cable and there are many different kinds of audio in and out. This is your standard RCA left and right. Then you also have digital. And let's talk about why there's two of them. This has an in and an out. So what does that mean? That means you can take the signal from your TV into this. This will beam it directly to your hearing aids via Bluetooth, but it will also send the signal out to another sound accessory. Right. I have a sound bar that, you know, people that I live with, people that I come home to, they use the sound bar.
I can use this. So now it's not I'm not just relying on just the TVs. We can still use our soundbar, which is pretty important to me because it's expensive and I like it. So two audio sources right into my hearing aids out into the sound bar. This is super cool. And this is this is not a common feature. Most of these TV link things, there is not an out for optical or for RCA. So this is pretty unique. And I love this thing. I didn't think I was going to like it, but it's super convenient. So now we're going to move on. We're going to talk about the completely In-canal option, which is the silk 7 x. These, as you can see, are much, much smaller. These this is the whole device, right? This whole thing goes in your ear and just kind of sits there kind of like a headphone but smaller and can do more stuff. These are not rechargeable. These do take 312 style batteries and you can get about five days on a pair of the batteries. So I would, you know, kind of assume you're going to be changing them at least once a week. Not my favorite thing. I would prefer rechargeable, but you can see these are so small. Where are you going to put that internal battery and a cable or a magnetic thing? Like it's just it's so small.
You can't even you can't you have to use the batteries. Speaking of so small, these are actually so small, they do not have a traditional Bluetooth transmitter. So you may be wondering, hey, how do I connect these to my phone if there is no Bluetooth. And the answer is you're going to use a QR code. So your hearing professional is going to be able to go in on his his or her end of the the system and create a unique QR code specifically for your hearing aids. So you're still going to use the Signia app. You just when you set up your hearing aids, instead of saying Bluetooth, it's going to say QR code and then you're going to scan this QR code with the camera and it's going to import all of those settings into the device, into the app, and then you're ready to go, which means these unfortunately cannot stream audio from your phone, right? You can't listen to music on them. You can't watch videos, you can't have anything audio from your device into your hearing aids. Some of you. That is a huge bummer. Other people, they don't care. It's not a big deal for them. These also utilize a similar dome style to the receiver in-canal pption, which is, like I said, one of my favorites. I love this dome style.
It's so snug, so comfortable. Very nice. These were also surprisingly powerful. I found myself hearing this is it's kind of weird to say I heard way more than I should. We were me and my me and my girlfriend. We were out to lunch one day and I heard a conversation at a table that I thought was way too far away. And I probably shouldn't have heard that conversation. Now, is that a bad thing? I don't think so. I think it just means these little guys got a lot more power than you think. So naturally, I dialed it back a little bit. I lowered the volume on my app and everything was fine. Now, speaking of the app, right, we talked about the fewer options and fewer capabilities of these silk completely in-canal devices. The app is still the same app. It's the Signia app. However, there are just fewer options on it right? You can't really do certain programs or you can't do certain options. It's just it's the same experience, just slightly more limited. Speaking about programs, right? You can still use similar programs like the custom programs, restaurant mode, noisy environment mode, music mode. They have something called a reverberant environment mode. You can still use all of those between the same two, between the between the two devices. You can still use the same programs or settings. These silks also come with a very similar set of accessories, but a few are going to be missing.
They do get the same case, which is super cool and awesome. You do still get the bag all rolled up. You do not get a charger because these do not charge. Right. These are batteries for pricing, right? The Signia silk has five different technology levels, all varying in pricing, which is kind of hard to explain. So please click that link, Go check out the pricing for all five levels. But essentially you're looking at anywhere from $2000 to $4000 for the pair. We just spent a little bit of time talking about the hearing aids individually, so let's spend some time kind of comparing them. The first thing I want to say, we're going to use an analogy, right? We got apples. We got oranges. They're both fruit, but they're very different. They both taste great. But they're very different they taste different. And that's how I kind of look at these, right? They both accomplish a similar task. They both are utilized in a similar way. However, they just go about it differently. Why would you want the receiver in canal, right? Why? Why? Why would someone want that? Well, Bluetooth connectivity, streaming audio, rechargeability capability. Hearing the level of hearing loss. Right. The receiver in Canal, like we said earlier, is for mild to severe. The completely in canal is more for moderate sorry, mild to moderate. So if you do have a severe or profound hearing loss, the completely in canal would probably not be recommended for you.
Why would you want the completely in canal? Right. Maybe. Maybe you're self conscious. Maybe you don't want to have hearing aids behind your ear. You just want to stick them in the canal and be done. That could be one thing. Maybe you don't really care about streaming audio, right? Having music pumped into them, watching videos, that doesn't really mean anything for you. The silk completely in canal would fulfill all your needs. Maybe you don't want a rechargeable set of hearing aids. Maybe you want the flexibility to just pop a battery out and pop a new one in. The silks can do that. The pure charge and go cannot. So we're going to make a quick list here. Who wins points, values, green check. We have the pure charge and go. We have the silk. Okay, So Bluetooth connectivity. We have to give it to the pure charge and go, streaming audio we have to give it to the pure charge and go. Size, we have to give it to the silk. Stealthiness. Right. Which one can you see less. We have to give it to the silk battery life. That is a hard one because technically the battery on the silk is like five days, but the battery on the pure charge and go is rechargeable. So that is completely preference based. And to avoid confrontation, I'm going to give it to both.
Sound quality.
What did the hearing aid sound like? I think the pure charge and go sounded more natural. I think the silk sounded more powerful. So again, I'm going to give it to both. Accessories. They both kind of come with the same stuff except the pure charge and go gets a charger and the silk does not because it doesn't need one, so they both get it. Premium accessories. Here's a here's kind of where the pure charge and go is going to win pure charge and go has all the premium accessories that we talked about earlier and is compatible with all the accessories. So pure charge and go wins. Silk, I'm sorry, you've just got that remote that probably no one's going to buy anyway. So unfortunately pure charge and go’s going to get that one at the end of the day. Green check marks aside. Right? Don't worry about that. It really comes down to you. Which one do you prefer? Which one do you feel more comfortable with? If you want something behind the ear receiver in canal style, then sure, the pure charge and go is going to be a no brainer. If you want something more simple, more straightforward, less buttons, less options, more, just do your job. I don't care about the other stuff then the silk is the way to go because it's pretty much plug and play, right? You set up the app, you scan the QR code, you put them in your ears and you change the batteries.
So back to that apples and oranges thing, right? They're both delicious. They're both healthy, they're both great. They're both fruit. But they taste. They look. They feel different. Same thing with these hearing aids. They both work. They both function. They're both great. They just operate, handle and process things differently. In terms of pricing, both of these hearing aids are going to come in at a lower cost, lower price point, and just generally more cost effective than, let's say, like a Phonak Oticon Widex Starkey kind of thing. To check the exact numbers for pricing, please feel free. Go go to ZipHearing.com, click around, check out the pricing. They're not shy about telling you how much things cost because they don't have to be shy because they are usually the best price. So please go click around, go have a ball, see how much cheaper these are than other models. See the different costs of the different technology levels. Just go, go. But don't go yet because I got to say goodbye. And with that being said, guys, thank you so much for watching yet another video from me and this face. So thank you so much. We will be back soon with another video from another brand with another product. So enjoy the rest of your day. Enjoy the rest of your night. Thank you so much. Bye.