I am experimenting....again

[palerider]

I don't know about an app on the phone for noise detection...if I can just barely hear the machine with my ear from the machine it's going to be tough.
I really think it is conductive noise which no one but me can hear....my husband and I have done this experiment before...he hears absolutely nothing beyond a faint hum of the machine with his ear right next to the machine and nothing at all 2 feet way....and I hear a little bit of darth vadar.

I will think on the app thing after I enlist hubby in this next experiment after we determine what he hears or doesn't hear. If he doesn't hear darth vadar with his face right next to mine...it's all in my head.

I was digging up the following when yaconsult suggested a phone app...

the following is from this app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... ectralview

this is my roomie using a s9 vauto at about 8cm from about 4 feet away:



and this is my vauto at 13 ps5 from about a foot away:



the frequency of the sound is shown by it's placement vertically, (right side legend) the loudness is shown by color (left side legend)

you can clearly see when I'd inhale and my vauto would switch to ipap.

there's background noise from a fan in another room down at the bottom...

[Pugsy]

I was digging up the following when yaconsult suggested a phone app...

the following is from this app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... ectralview

Got it downloaded. Will play with it later once I figure out how to use it and I need to make sure both machines are delivering the same pressure (or as close as I can get).

I do know that pressure used will impact things...sigh...another thing to try to figure out how to use it.
My new phone and a new app.

[Luthie2006]

WOW, Pugsy. Best of luck to you with your new CPAP equipment; you are remarkable and so "CPAP" talented plus you have to be a wiz with computers as well.

[nanwilson]

....... And you will keep on experimenting.. (chuckle)
Good luck and congrats on your new acquisition.

[Pugsy]

Oh...before I forget it.
That damn beep when the machine turns on....that's so annoying and I see now why people were wanting silent mode with this model machine. It's so much louder and more annoying than the other PR S1 beeps were.
I will probably be doing the Qtip silencer trick real soon.
I always go to bed after hubby and that siren beep wouldn't be good for him to hear. I was totally amazed at how different it sounded from the other beeps with the other models. No wonder you guys were bitching about it.

[bwexler]

After reading this thread, I went and downloaded a sound meter app from the Google Play Store. I chose the first one, with 10 million downloads and 4.5 star rating.
WOW!
My environment is noisy. in my bedroom with the door closed and in absolute silence except for my tinnitus, it registers 30 db. My PR s1 960 with my mask on registers from 50 to 65 db. The 65 is on inhale. so the Darth Vader effect at least on mine is not just conductive noise, the meter heard it too.

I have been complaining about the noise for a year and a half since I switched from the S9 Autoset to the 960. they have replaced the Humidifier and replaced the blower unit. It is still noisy. It would be interesting to see real comparisons between AirCurve, S9 Adapt and PR 960 using the same sound meter app about 2-3 inches from each machine. I realize ambient noise, mask vent variations etc could skew the data, but since the app is free and many already have smart phones, the cost is only about 5 minutes time for each participant.

[Pugsy]

So far with preliminary experiments using the app that PR suggested...and only with the 960 right now as to do the Adapt means putting everything all back together and I will do that later...the 960 inhale noise that I hear isn't totally in my head and I can definitely vary the intensity with varying the force of my inhale.
But with my back to my machine and my arms holding the phone in front of me...probably about 4 feet from the machine it barely can detect my inhale noise. So I am assuming that part of it is in my head and part of it isn't...at least for right now.
I am also still struggling with mastering a screen shot off my phone so you call can see what I see.

I went and downloaded a sound meter app from the Google Play Store. I chose the first one, with 10 million downloads and 4.5 star rating.

Which one did you get? I want to make sure I get the one you got and I will give it a try.

Will be later though..right now I am fed up to my eyeballs with learning new electronic crap...what with the phone and new apps and tricks and Windows 8.1.
Time to take a break from thinking so hard.

Remember I had a bad night last night and my patience level is very thin right now.

[Pugsy]

So okay, curiosity got the best of me and I went and downloaded the first app that popped up under app search for sound meter.
The worst I could get the 960 to go to was 45 and that was with a big forceful inhale and the phone essentially 1 inch from the machine. Normal breathing it stayed a little below 40...and ambient room noise around 28.
With the phone about 2 feet from the machine it barely registered above 30. Hubby won't ever hear the machine unless the damn thing beeps. I am going now to look for some Q tips.

Pressures used...inhale 10 and exhale 7 with P10 nasal pillows which we all know are pretty much silent in terms of vent noise.

Using that app is a lot easier than my trying to use the analyzer thing and get a screen shot and gives me a number that I can probably evaluate more easily.

[bwexler]

I had totally missed PRS post on the analyzer. I agree it is way to complicated for us mere mortals. The simple app you and I found is so much easier to use.

[squid13]

I guess I have the solution that works best for my wife and I. It works for my 960 and my Adapt Auto. When we both go to bed, we remove the hearing aids from both ears and they can sound like a hay bailer and we wouldn't hear it. I can hear lightening if it hits close by thought.

[Sleeprider]

Your insights on different machines not only satisfies your wander-lust, but ultimately helps many who come here looking for information.

I spent years on a M-Series auto CPAP, and updated that last December, then got the bug to try a BiPAP in January. You and I communicated at a time when I was pretty frustrated with the PRS1 760 and was considering selling it. I went back and had great success with it. Currently I'm using a PS of 5.0 on EPAP of 8.0 in full auto mode, and that is working pretty well.

One of the things I'm curious about with your 960 experiment is if the number of machine initiated breaths significantly exceeds your CAI. What was your experience on that with the S9 VPAP Adapt? Do you ever feel the machine is taking over, and are you aware of the machine initiated breaths when they occur?

[Pugsy]

One of the things I'm curious about with your 960 experiment is if the number of machine initiated breaths significantly exceeds your CAI. What was your experience on that with the S9 VPAP Adapt? Do you ever feel the machine is taking over, and are you aware of the machine initiated breaths when they occur?

Remember I never really had a problem with centrals. I do have them occasionally just like everyone else and the Adapt did seem to respond with a big puff but I always slept right through whatever it wanted to do to me.
It's always been that way. I go to sleep and that's it...never really notice any pressure changes. It was the same when I was on apap and the bipap auto when I would see pressures around 18 in probable REM stage sleep but in non REM my minimum pressure would stay in the 10 to 12 range. Pressure changes have never bothered me at all.

It's a rare night that it takes me very long to go to sleep. I have looked at the flow rate up close and most of the time it's easy to spot the change to asleep...and sometimes it's just barely 2 or 3 minutes.
When I do wake in the night it's always been something unrelated to what the machine might be doing. I don't think I have ever woke up and looked over to see what the pressure was at because it never feels like anything other than normal breathing to me.

I know that people talked about the Adapt as being a fairly strict task master but I never felt like it wanted me to do anything that wasn't what I was doing.
Comparing the Adapt to the S9 VPAP auto...to be honest if it wasn't for the pressures that I use for that short time while awake I would be hard pressed to tell the difference between the 2 machines in terms of my sleep.
With the VPAP Auto I had to use 10 EPAP and 14 IPAP when first starting the night while awake and then it did its thing while I was asleep and I never knew what it did until I saw a report. Sometimes some big changes and sometimes not but I never knew it.
With the Adapt I use 6.6 EPAP and 9.6 IPAP when first starting the night and then it does its thing with a rather wide range but I am asleep so I don't care.

My preference for the Adapt is mainly from that awake time difference...6.6/9.6 is simply more comfortable than 10/14 or 10/13. I know it's a silly little thing because I don't spend much awake time on the machine. Since the adapt can respond faster to obstructions too...I don't have to use as much baseline pressure. Now for some people that rather rapid response might be a problem but it isn't for me at all.
So overall I spend more time at lower pressures and let the machine deal with the OAs when it needs to and it does it rapidly but since the changes aren't a problem for me...it's a win win situation overall.
I have seen EPAP go from 6.6 to 14 in about 20 seconds...the apaps and bilevel autos can't do that and that's why we have to use a higher baseline to give the machine a better head start.

I am of the mind set that anything that lets me be more comfortable in general, and that includes that piddly awake time at lower pressures, will translate into more natural and comfortable sleep in general. Does it make any difference in how I actually feel during the day...I don't know that it does but it sure doesn't hurt me.

You know STL Mark was instrumental in getting me to try the Adapt because of just what I described above. We don't technically need what it can do in terms of centrals but what it can do in terms of OA response and let us use lower pressures overall works well for us.
It's not for people who find pressure changes to be a problem though. If APAP changes are a problem for someone than I sure wouldn't be using this therapy for OA stuff unless centrals were a problem and we just have to tell someone to suck it up and you will get used to it (and a person would but it would take some time).

I know the 960 supposedly isn't quite so quick to respond and I haven't had a chance to really see if it impacts the OA stuff that much because last night I inadvertently didn't set minimum EPAP quite to where it needed to be.
I will know more after a few nights when I see where EPAP/IPAP needs to be and how that compares to what I was using on the Adapt.

I have always been rather fortunate in that I seem to adapt easily to whatever changes I might make in my experimenting. The very first time I tried bilevel and it was on a bipap pro that I was testing out for someone I knew immediately that I wanted one for my own.
I never really had a problem exhaling on apap single pressures but using bilevel was night and day different in comfort for me and I figure if I am going to have to have this alien strapped to my face that I damn well want to be as comfortable as possible.

[Sleeprider]

Interesting explanation. The magic of bilevel wash't really apparent to me until I let it really run at 4-5 pressure support. During that SWJ that happens in transitional sleep I am aware of the machine switching to IPAP when I'm at the bottom of a respiratory cycle, and what would likely have been a central just goes away. It's almost too effortless and comfortable. I have always had pretty good pressure swings on APAP and rarely noticed them. When I first started with the BiPAP the pressure differential IPAP/EPAP seemed to induce more centrals, although OA went essentially to zero. As I got used to it, AHI results are pretty similar to auto CPAP, but it does seem more comfortable, and RERA is significantly down.

Enjoy the journey!

[Pugsy]

The magic of bilevel wash't really apparent to me until I let it really run at 4-5 pressure support.

I am okay with 3 to 5 in terms of comfort but 4 PS is the most comfortable for me when using the 10 EPAP but when I use the 6ish EPAP the 3 feels just as good as 4 does when using 10 EPAP.

Rested Gal told me quite some time ago that once I went to bilevel I would never want to go back and she was right.
It's one of the reasons I tend to suggest the ResMed cpap/apap machines to people wondering which machine to buy.
EPR is essentially bilevel PS but limited to 3 max...3 is better than 2 or 1 or 0.
Respironics Flex relief is limited to 2 cm maximum and that's only if a person breathes rather forcefully. People who tend to breathe more shallow aren't going to get the 2 cm and it might make the difference in adjusting more easily to this therapy for some people. So since we never know I always think it's better to have something and not need it than need it and not have it...and be uncomfortable or have difficulty adjusting.

[Sleeprider]

I agree with one caveat. Too many new patients are issued auto machines with wide open settings starting at 4 cm. When they use EPR at 3 we often see huge clusters of OA, H and UA as a result of the inadequate EPAP. The EPR has the potential to increase comfort, but without some guidance, it may be a cause of inadequate treatment if the minimum pressure is not adequate to support the respiratory structure in EPAP. It is often difficult to persuade these people that it is just not going to work a low pressure, and they think they should wait to see a doctor or technician before making changes, even though no prescription was ever input into their machine.

Anyway, that's off topic a bit. Sounds like you found the VPAP Adapt better than Bilevel auto, and I doubt many people have a basis of comparison between the Resmed and PRS1 products.