I have to cobble up a solution, too - but having been immersed in audio and being no stranger to the physics involved (and enough of: how the ear ackshully 'hears' stuff / what it means when the teeny cilia have broken-off, etc.) --

I'm still 'innovating'.

As I see it: the absurd prices for clever on-the-fly compensation are determined by

A) the vanity factor: make it too-small (imagining you can somehow get around the physics, spacing, separation of mic/'speaker' and physiology) and

B) the White-coat + 'mysterious' (to most) techno 'instruments, and the patter which capitalizes [literally] upon the ignorance factor; the unawareness of how such audio manipulation is today dirt-cheap.. if it's in a small box and not crammed into a vitamin pill that disappears into the ear canal.

I'm still evaluating (casually.. did I mention I'm lazy about research 'projects'?) what I might do with some bargain-steal close-outs of a half-cigarette-pack sized light-plastic box with an actually decent amp, 3 sliders for a crude filter-set - and how, practically - to do much more than the simple filters installed.
(I have some spares, should you want to play, too..)

My next stage would be evaluating the numerous Bluetooth or similar high-quality (ie near-flat actual SPL-response) over-ear speaker/transducer gadgets, though I'd not mind a small wire - depending on all factors.


Some minor factoids, theoretical and as verified-by-ear..

1) You need more than one 'program' - for hearing an orchestra VS ordering a Czechvar in a Coors hangout.

2) The problem is finding the design work already done, but not ultra-miniaturized. A digital controller would make n-programs an instant matter, permit cute things with those clever filters with steep sides.. to tailor for a variety of environmental situations. As with those other omnipresent 'programmable' boxes - the interface! determines just how much whiz-bang cleverness you can first arrive at through personal experiment.. then sanely control, on-the-fly.

3) The ACID test of any 'solution', as regards speech is ever: the Sibilants; you need to hear someone speaking all those intermingled ff's, ss's, ph's and particularly th's! Before/After - with great concentration. Somehow you have to restore.?. a bit of the 2000 - 4000 Hz response (and of course - perpetually stay Way-away from landing jets and Acid Rock-halls..) There aren't many of those critical teensy hairs left in the cochlea area: no amount of AMPlification can wiggle a cilium that's departed for other dimensions.


But my approach is irrelevant - if you want this thing to be near-invisible.
Vanity costs not only $$ but severe compromises in achievable audio performance and your ability to have that flexible control in a form YOU can Access (not via jeweller's screwdriver or magic boxes owned by the Vendor. Hmmm Windoze again.)

I gauge my hearing delta-% via merely cupping hands behind ears:
the noted difference is as good as a Fourier analyzer! if one has some idea of what happens in what octaves of speech, music (sirens, etc.)

Astounding how much $$ can be extracted to get.. not much more improvement than this simple test. Of course, this level Can be improved upon - but I don't believe (yet) that any of the teeny gadgets can come close to what could be done cheaper-while-larger.

I'll find out. Alas too.. while the $$ remains absurd - there seems little actual competition, probably because of the white-coat syndrome, a plethora of small vendors hawking SMALL items.. pretty similarly limited - and the fact that most people are too lazy to find out even a little about the elements of the Problem / and the means for addressing (at least many..) of the underachieving body-parts.

As one who despises Hype at any intensity.. I was prepared for the above marketing - but even with a local ~ept guy with some fancy equipment: wasn't prepared for the lack of candor about the actual limitations of (and my brief right-there tests of) even the high-priced spread.

It's as if all these guys have tacitly agreed that we shall all settle for a really bitchin 4-cylinder side-valve with chrome valve-cover: ie. it's as if Redmond had fucked this industry exactly the way it lies to itself.
(So even if I had a free-pass for one of these Ferraris with a '47 Plymouth engine.. I'd demur. Guess it's a curse, knowin even a little-Shit -- immersed in a culture that prides itself on wishful dumbth.) Oh well..


Rotsa ruck in the 'auditions', though - maybe I lied, and you'll find something that will -Suddenly- let you hear that triangle! in Petrouchka, the crystal purity of Sergei Nakariakov's pianissimo high-G or even.. hear the rain, again.


Ashton


:opTy

Indeed, along with the bizness/social aspect of joining the Damaged (you know.. like females with normal body dimensions.) It's likely easier to do an arabesque around conditioned xenophobia if younger; if older - then the caricatures of (what Else is broken??) are apt to trump. Me - I don't care if 'they' think its a You-pod or a defibrillator.

Nice book. But I shan't be designing the clockwork.. for one thing, that's mandatory production of small ckt-boards; mainly though, I lack the EE experience of breadboarding a cpu-based project, let alone devising an interface == levels on levels on..

So I'll be looking for a sorta-DSP 'kit' - already possessing a serviceable enclosure, amp for grafting, in/out. There are several good-fidelity small 'speakers' with their own 'enclosure' sorta-compensated, as there are good teeny mics. Usual tedium running down 'lecronics pieces in small qty. Gadget would have to include the microcode and designer's concept of the physical controls. (A scope, swept osc. will answer the rest, for those of us without a spectrum analyzer to hand.)

Your list of curve titles is the idea, but behind those are lots of ??? re notch filters, filters with variable slope for 'attack' - and likely the best of these data are $uppressed, just like Doze source (even to the point that - there might be some guffaws at revelation of the assumptions, in some of the rationale ;-)

Anyway, audio is today full of mavericks as well as the usual surfeit of purveyors of $100+/ft "speaker waveguides", tested for skin-depth effects, into the GHz.. Which-all is why I don't expect soon to get much beyond an improved mic and (easy) an accurate ear-speaker + decision on its placement.

Besides, there's something unHealthy/idiotic about spending more for an amplifer than for one's Wheels.


Poco \ufffd poco