Removing time delays in signal paths

• US 20070094010A1
• Filed: 09/29/2006
• Published: 04/26/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 10/24/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: LG Electronics, Inc. (LG Corporation)
• Original Assignee: LG Electronics, Inc. (LG Corporation)
• Inventors: Pang, Hee, Jung, Yang, Kim, Dong, Lim, Jae, Oh, Hyen
• Granted Patent: US 7,761,289 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/204
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/008 Multichannel audio signal coding or decoding using interchannel correlation to reduce redundancy, e.g. joint-stereo, intensity-coding or matrixing
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/167 Audio streaming, i.e. formatting and decoding of an encoded audio signal representation into a data stream for transmission or storage purposes
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/18 Vocoders using multiple modes
• CPC Class Codes: H04S 7/30 Control circuits for electronic adaptation of the sound field

Abstract

The disclosed embodiments include systems, methods, apparatuses, and computer-readable mediums for compensating one or more signals and/or one or more parameters for time delays in one or more signal processing paths.

Claims

1. A method of processing an audio signal, comprising:

receiving an audio signal including a downmix signal and spatial information;

converting the downmix signal from a first domain to a second domain to provide a first converted downmix signal;

converting the first converted downmix signal from the second domain to a third domain to provide a second converted downmix signal; and

combining the second converted downmix signal and the spatial information,

wherein the combined spatial information is delayed by an amount of time that includes an elapsed time of the converting.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving an audio signal further comprises:

receiving spatial information that has been compensated for at least a portion of the time delay.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first converting steps further comprises:

converting the downmix signal from a time domain to a frequency domain.

4. The method of claims 3, wherein the frequency domain includes a QMF domain.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the second converting step further comprises:

converting the first converted downmix signal from a Quadrature Mirror Filter (QMF) real signal to a QMF complex signal.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the second converting step further comprises:

converting the first converted downmix signal from a Quadrature Mirror Filter (QMF) complex signal to a real QMF signal.

7. A method of processing an audio signal, comprising:

receiving an audio signal of which time synchronization between a downmix signal and spatial information is matched according to a first decoding scheme;

decoding the downmix signal to provide a decoded downmix signal in one of at least two downmix input domains; and

compensating for a time synchronization difference between the received downmix signal and the spatial information if the decoding is performed according to a second decoding scheme using the received downmix signal and the spatial information.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein in the time synchronization difference compensating, at least one of the received downmix signal and the spatial information is led or lagged and a total leading or lagging time corresponds to the time synchronization difference.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the downmix input domains include a time domain and a Quadrature Mirror Filter (QMF) domain.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the time synchronization difference is a total of a first time synchronization difference associated with the decoding and a second time synchronization difference associated with other processing.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the second time synchronization difference is a difference between a first delay time occurring until a time point of combining the downmix signal and the spatial information in accordance with the first decoding scheme, and a second delay time occurring until a time point of combining the downmix signal and the spatial information in accordance with the second decoding scheme.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein each of the first and second decoding schemes corresponds to one of a decoding scheme based on power and a decoding scheme based on audio quality, and the first and second decoding schemes are different from each other.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein in the time synchronization difference compensating, the received downmix signal is delayed by an amount of time including a first elapsed time associated with a complexity domain conversion and the spatial information is delayed by an amount of time including a second elapsed time associated with a time domain to frequency domain conversion, if the first decoding scheme is based on power and the second decoding scheme is based on quality.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

generating a plural-channel signal using the compensated downmix signal and spatial information; and

compensating for a time synchronization difference between the plural-channel signal and a time-series data.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the time-series data includes at least one of a moving picture, a still image and text.

16. A system for processing an audio signal, comprising:

a first decoder configured for receiving an audio signal of which time synchronization between a downmix signal and spatial information is matched according to a first decoding scheme, and for decoding the downmix signal; and

a second decoder operatively coupled to the first decoder and configured for;

receiving the decoded downmix signal in one of at least two downmix input domains; and

compensating for a time synchronization difference between the received downmix signal and the spatial information, if the decoding is performed according to a second decoding scheme using the received downmix signal and the spatial information.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein in the time synchronization difference compensating, at least one of the received downmix signal and the spatial information is led or lagged and a total leading or lagging time corresponds to the time synchronization difference.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the downmix input domains include a time domain and a Quadrature Mirror Filter (QMF) domain.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the time synchronization difference is a total of a first time synchronization difference associated with the decoding and a second time synchronization difference associated with other processing.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the second time synchronization difference is a difference between a first delay time occurring until a time point of combining the downmix signal and the spatial information in accordance with the first decoding scheme, and a second delay time occurring until a time point of combining the downmix signal and the spatial information in accordance with the second decoding scheme.

21. The system of claim 16, wherein each of the first and second decoding schemes corresponds to one of a decoding scheme based on power and a decoding scheme based on audio quality, and the first and second decoding schemes are different from each other.

22. The system of claim 21, wherein in the time synchronization difference compensating, the received downmix signal is delayed by an amount of time including a first elapsed time associated with a complexity domain conversion and the spatial information is delayed by an amount of time including a second elapsed time associated with a time domain to frequency domain conversion, if the first decoding scheme is based on power and the second decoding scheme is based on quality.

23. The system of claim 22, further comprising:

generating a plural-channel signal using the compensated downmix signal and spatial information; and

compensating for a time synchronization difference between the plural-channel signal and a time-series data.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein the time-series data includes at least one of a moving picture, a still image and text.

25. A computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon, which, when executed by a processor causes the processor to perform the operations of:

receiving an audio signal including a downmix signal and spatial information;

converting the downmix signal from a first domain to a second domain to provide a first converted downmix signal;

converting the first converted downmix signal from the second domain to a third domain to provide a second converted downmix signal;

compensating the second converted downmix signal for a time delay resulting from the converting; and

combining the second converted downmix signal and the spatial information.

26. A computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon, which, when executed by a processor causes the processor to perform the operations of:

receiving an audio signal of which time synchronization between a downmix signal and spatial information is matched according to a first decoding scheme;

decoding the downmix signal to provide a decoded downmix signal in one of at least two downmix input domains; and

compensating for a time synchronization difference between the received downmix signal and the spatial information if the decoding is performed according to a second decoding scheme using the received downmix signal and the spatial information.

27. A method of processing an audio signal, comprising:

receiving an audio signal including a downmix signal and spatial information;

converting the downmix signal from a first domain to a second domain to provide a first converted downmix signal;

converting the first converted downmix signal from the second domain to a third domain to provide a second converted downmix signal;

compensating the second converted downmix signal for a time delay resulting from the converting; and

combining the second converted downmix signal and the spatial information.