A toll quality 8 kb/s speech codec for the personal communications system (PCS)

• Published in: IEEE transactions on vehicular technology Vol. 43; no. 3; pp. 808 - 816
• Main Authors: Salami, R., Laflamme, C., Adoul, J.-P., Massaloux, D.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 01.08.1994
• Subjects: Degradation; Digital signal processing; Digital signal processing chips; Encoding; Performance evaluation; Personal communication networks; Quantization; Speech codecs; Standardization; Testing
• ISSN: 0018-9545
• DOI: 10.1109/25.312763

A toll quality speech codec at 8 kb/s suitable for the future personal communications system is presented. The codec is currently under standardization by the ITU-T (successor of CCITT) where the codec terms of reference were mainly determined considering PCS application. The encoding algorithm is based on algebraic code-excited linear prediction (ACELP) and has a speech frame of 10 ms. Efficient pitch and codebook search strategies, along with efficient quantization procedures, have been developed to achieve toll quality encoded speech with a complexity implementable on current fixed-point DSP chips. Formal subjective listening tests, performed by ITU-T SG 12, showed that the codec quality is equivalent to that of G.726 ADPCM at 32 kb/s in error-free conditions and it outperforms G.726 under error conditions. The codec performs adequately under tandeming conditions, and can support a frame erasure rate up to 3% with a degradation in its performance that is still worse than the ITU-T requirements, and this is one subject of study for the next phase. The algorithm has been implemented on a single fixed-point DSP for the ITU-T subjective rest, and required about 29 MIPS. An optimized version, however, requires 24 MIPS without any speech quality degradation.< >