BeHear SMARTO Personal Hearing Amplifier

BeHear® SMARTO is a rechargeable hand-held or body worn hearing amplifier from Israeli Technology. This award-winning device is designed to be an affordable, and easy to use, option for people seeking improved audibility in live conversation, phone calls, and other situations where streamed audio is desired.

Doctor of Audiology and audio engineer Dr Steve Taddei recently acquired the BeHear® SMARTO Hearing Amplifier and measured its performance in the HearingTracker Lab.

SMARTO is a standalone device and does not require hearing aids or other technologies to work. It can be paired with a smartphone via Bluetooth® improving ease of use and unlocking several features to be discussed shortly. It provides up to a reported 70 decibels (dB) of amplification and is therefore designed for those in need of significant hearing assistance. It also offers many features found in more advanced hearing technologies such as noise reduction, directional microphones, tailored amplification, and tinnitus sound therapies.

General Use and What’s in the Box

In the box, you will find the main SMARTO unit, a charging cradle, two different headsets, and a few other accessories. The included Quick Start Guide is an easy read providing stepped instruction for first time users. The unit is nearly ready for use out of the box and can either be clipped to a pocket or worn around your neck with the included lanyard. As previously mentioned, both headphones and earbuds are included and can be used depending on your preference. The headphones are supra aural, meaning they sit on the outer face of your pinna and do not completely cover the ears. The earbuds are pretty standard and have single flange soft silicone tips. Extra headphone covers and various earbud tip sizes are included to improve fit and comfort.

Regarding power, the unit has an internal lithium ion rechargeable battery capable of up to 48 hours of use per charge. Less battery life can be expected with audio streaming and high levels of processing. The unit is magnetized which aids proper seating within the charging cradle. It also vibrates upon contact further indicating connection. The unit takes 2-3 three hours to charge and an LED indicator changes from red to green when it is ready. A USB Type-C port is also present on the bottom of the SMARTO unit so it can be charged directly. While this cable is included in the box, a wall plug will need to be purchased separately. 

Once the unit is charged, and headphones are connected, the unit can be turned on via a small positional switch on the side. The device should feel familiar to anyone who has used a TV controller and users should find it intuitive as adjustments are noted by various LEDs on the device faceplace. 

How Does BeHear SMARTO Help you Hear

Alango packed impressive digital signal processing (DSP) into BeHear SMARTO. Many of its features are rather advanced and akin to what you traditionally find in conventional hearing aids. As such, it holds much promise for improving audibility—such as clearer speech in background noise. Let us break down some of the features and take a deeper dive.

One of the main features beyond general volume adjustments is control over the tonal balance. This allows you to not only alter the level of incoming audio but also boost either the bass or treble frequency ranges. This is a nice feature for general listening preferences. For example, many may find they prefer a bass boost while streaming music. Conversely, the treble boost can improve speech clarity during conversation, or while watching TV, as consonants will be more audible.

In Figure 1, you can see how and where SMARTO’s tonal balance affects the spectrum. The crossover frequency is roughly 2000 Hz (noted by the red dotted line) meaning any treble boost will occur equally to all frequencies above this range. The same applies to the bass boost only below 2000 Hz. Tonal adjustments had little influence on the frequency range above or below the roughly 2000 Hz cutoff.

With the tonal adjustment at maximum, my testing indicated that SMARTO offers a roughly 12 dB increase either way. Furthermore, SMARTO seems to store any treble or bass adjustments for live conversation or audio streaming separately. This means your previous adjustments are stored and automatically recalled whenever using the device.

SoundFocus™ Directionality and Noise Reduction

Background noise is one of the most common culprits of poor speech understanding. This is because important speech elements can be overpowered by undesirable distracting environmental sounds. When this occurs, we generally seek to improve the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Meaning, we implement various processes to increase how loud the speech signal is relative to unwanted noise.

SMARTO offers two common techniques for improving SNR. SoundFocus™, or SMARTO’s directional microphones, is one option that can be turned-on directly from the handheld unit via a large orange button. Once engaged, SMARTO will charge from an omnidirectional microphone pattern, which is equally sensitive to sounds from all directions, to a more directional fixed pattern. Doing so should accentuate the clarity of sounds in front of the unit. It can therefore be pointed like a flashlight at sounds you wish to hear better.

Another common means of improving SNR involves digital noise reduction. There are different approaches to this depending on the device and its processing capabilities. SMARTO relies on a process known as spectral gating which decreases the volume of frequency ranges dominated by noise. This method is similar to what we see in conventional hearing aids.

To estimate the possible SNR benefits of SMARTO, speech and Café noise from the Ambisonics Recordings of Typical Environments (ARTE) Database were presented to the unit in our lab³. Recordings were made with and without SoundFocus™ and noise reduction enabled and SNR improvement was then estimated using a phase-inversion method¹. Figure 2 shows the estimated improvements relative to SMARTO’s omnidirectional microphone without noise reduction enabled. My testing suggested that the greatest SNR improvement can be heard using their noise reduction at its highest setting (roughly 5 dB). Engaging their directional microphone feature (SoundFocus™) did offer some improvement, albeit less. This was also found to be the case when combining their directional microphone with noise reduction.

It is important to note that the Café recording used approximated a realistic everyday environment where noise is more diffuse, or coming from all-around⁴. However, it is possible for noise to be mainly from one direction. In these cases, it is likely that the SNR improvement seen with SMARTO would be greater. It is also important to mention that the phase-inversion method is an estimate of SNR improvement and can be limited based on variables such as environment complexity and algorithm stability.

SMARTO offers one final means of noise reduction. By including a third microphone on both the earbuds and headphones, SMARTO is able to analyze and minimize any noise from physically moving and handling the unit. This is an important feature to consider as these vibrations tend to be very loud as they are generated directly from the unit and microphones. Designers of the product further indicated that this can also help reduce wind noise should the device be used outdoors.

Hear SMARTO for Yourself

In these comparisons, you will hear how BeHear SMARTO sounds with the tone control at a neutral position, maximum treble boost, and maximum bass boost.

In these comparisons, you will hear SMARTO in its standard omnidirectional microphone position with noise reduction set at minimum. The samples will then progress to (1) directional microphone setting without noise reduction, (2) omnidirectional microphone with noise reduction at maximum, and finally (3) a directional microphone setting with noise reduction at maximum. 

Can SMARTO be Programmed for Hearing Loss

Users can further adjust SMARTO to their hearing preferences through the BeHear app Personalization tab. Here, the unit can be programmed to function more like a conventional hearing device where audiometric data, or hearing thresholds, are used to define device output gain. The app provides three options for doing this:

1. Users can choose a hearing profile from a library of common hearing loss configurations.
2. Hearing thresholds obtained from a hearing care provider can be manually entered through their Editor.
3. A Personal Assessment tab allows you to perform a self-guided hearing threshold assessment over headphones. The process takes only a few minutes and tests frequencies between 500 and 8000 Hz.

Threshold based personalization is a useful feature however, it is important to know that test results are easily influenced by the environment, the headphones used, attention, familiarity with the testing procedure, among other variables. For these reasons and more, device based hearing assessments do not replicate the accuracy and care of visiting a professional in the field.

BeHear App and Wireless Connectivity

BeHear SMARTO is equipped with Bluetooth® 5.0 and supports several codecs such as low-latency aptX. Through this, SMARTO can be connected directly with Android and iPhone based smartphones to control processing, answer calls, and stream audio. While the BeHear app is required to access many of the more advanced features, those less inclined to use smartphones will appreciate that SMARTO has large colorful buttons for answering and ending calls. EasyListen™ technology is also available which can slow down speech during mobile conversations. SMARTO also has a single-press emergency call button for those with a history of falls and or limited mobility.

If you struggle with TV clarity, BeHear offers the HearLink PLUS Transmitter which streams low-latency audio directly to SMARTO—and your ears.

Tinnitus Masker

Another more hidden feature with SMARTO is the sound therapy tinnitus masker. Individuals who experience tinnitus may find this helpful as the static-like sounds can be presented to decrease the perception of any ringing, buzzing, hissing, etc.This feature is only accessible through their app and allows you to fine tune elements such as volume, frequency, bandwidth, modulation, and balance between the ears.

If you are more accustomed to other tinnitus apps such as Resound Relief, they can still be streamed to the device via Bluetooth. However, doing so will put SMARTO into a streaming mode disabling the onboard microphones.

Final Thoughts

Alango’s BeHear SMARTO is a versatile amplification device boasting an impressive set of features. I found it intuitive and easy to use even when venturing into the BeHear app. The tone adjustment offers considerable personalization and my testing supports that SMARTO can improve speech clarity—even in more complex everyday environments. I therefore think it is a great consideration for those in search of a hand-held or body worn device.

While it is nice that BeHear included various headsets, I do wish a circumaural option where the headphones completely surround your ears was available. Circumaural headphones can be more comfortable and can provide passive sound attenuation. This may result in even better SNR improvements from the device. While you can always connect a third-party set of headphones, you will lose the benefits of their handling noise reduction.

If you are interested in improving your hearing, it is highly recommended that you follow-up with a hearing care provider first. This will provide you the best opportunity to assess your hearing, learn strategies for communication, discuss available technologies, and more. With that said, BeHear SMARTO is one tool among many that can be used to help compensate for a hearing injury and therefore improve your quality of life.

My Rating

Behear SMARTO is an extremely versatile body worn or handheld personal amplification device. The combination of personalization, wireless connectivity, and noise reduction features makes this a highly-capable device for those in need of hearing assistance.