QNX SOFTWARE SYSTEMS (WAVEMAKERS), INC. Patent applications |
Patent application number | Title | Published |
20100107856 | KARAOKE SYSTEM - The system describes a karaoke system that enhances the experience of singing along with music, but without the need to display the lyrics. The system includes a combination of a vocal track reducer and an echo canceller, decision logic for determining when a person is talking or singing (double-talk detector) and a method for “ducking” (i.e., attenuating) the vocal track when the singing is detected. No special CD or DVD with lyric tracks is required, making the system capable of working with CD, mp3, AM, FM, HD radio, satellite radio signals, or any other suitable content source. The result is that any content source may potentially be used as a karaoke soundtrack without any pre-modification. | 05-06-2010 |
20090222268 | SPEECH SYNTHESIS SYSTEM HAVING ARTIFICIAL EXCITATION SIGNAL - A speech synthesis system synthesizes a speech signal corresponding to an input speech signal based on a spectral envelope of the input speech signal. A glottal pulse generator generates a time series of glottal pulses, that are processed into a glottal pulse magnitude spectrum. A shaping circuit shapes the glottal pulse magnitude spectrum based on the spectral envelope and generates a shaped glottal pulse magnitude spectrum. A harmonic null adjustment circuit reduces harmonic nulls in the shaped glottal pulse magnitude spectrum and generates a null-adjusted synthesized speech spectrum. An inverse transform circuit generates a null-adjusted time-series speech signal. An overlap and add circuit synthesizes the speech signal based on the null-adjusted time-series speech signal. | 09-03-2009 |
20090216530 | Interference detector - A system improves speech detection or processing by identifying registration signals. The system encodes a limited frequency band by varying the amplitude of a pulse width modulated signal between predefined values. The signal is separated into frequency bins that identify amplitude and phase. The registration signal is measured by comparing a difference in average acoustic power in a plurality of adjacent bins over time. | 08-27-2009 |
20090150144 | Robust voice detector for receive-side automatic gain control - A voice detector improves voice output quality. The voice detector may be incorporated into a cellphone, hands-free car phone, or any other device that provides voice output. The voice detector provides excellent voice output quality even when signal dropouts and other significant signal artifacts are present in the received signal. Not only does the high quality voice output improve the listening experience, it also benefits downstream processing systems that further process the voice signal. | 06-11-2009 |
20090116661 | MIXER WITH ADAPTIVE POST-FILTERING - A noise reduction system includes multiple transducers that generate time domain signals. A transforming device transforms the time domain signals into frequency domain signals. A signal mixing device mixes the frequency domain signals according to a mixing ratio. Frequency domain signals are rotated in phase to generate phase rotated signals. A post-processing device attenuates portions of the output based on coherence levels of the signals. | 05-07-2009 |
20090112579 | SPEECH ENHANCEMENT THROUGH PARTIAL SPEECH RECONSTRUCTION - A system improves speech intelligibility by reconstructing speech segments. The system includes a low-frequency reconstruction controller programmed to select a predetermined portion of a time domain signal. The low-frequency reconstruction controller substantially blocks signals above and below the selected predetermined portion. A harmonic generator generates low-frequency harmonics in the time domain that lie within a frequency range controlled by a background noise modeler. A gain controller adjusts the low-frequency harmonics to substantially match the signal strength to the time domain original input signal. | 04-30-2009 |
20090076824 | REMOTE CONTROL SERVER PROTOCOL SYSTEM - A remote control server protocol system transports data to a client system. The client system communicates with the server application using a platform-independent communications protocol. The client system sends commands and audio data to the server application. The server application may respond by transmitting audio and other messages to the client system. The messages may be transmitted over a single communications channel. | 03-19-2009 |
20090040289 | VIDEO PHONE SYSTEM - A system allocates channel bandwidth based on the data received from a plurality of remote sources. A de-multiplexer/priority circuit separates two or more different data streams into their components parts. A stream modification driver modifies one or more characteristics of the data received from the de-multiplexer/priority circuit based on a priority assigned to the data by the de-multiplexer/priority circuit. The de-multiplexer/priority circuit determines the data transfer rates for each of the different data streams based on the assigned priority. | 02-12-2009 |
20080281584 | FAST ACOUSTIC CANCELLATION - A speech enhancement system improves the perceptual quality of an aural signal. A receiver detects and receives an unvoiced signal, a fully voiced signal, or a mixed voice remote signal. A coherence processor identifies the similarities or differences between a local signal and the remote signal. A cancellation processor or controller dampens reflected signals that may be part of the local signal. | 11-13-2008 |
20080228478 | Targeted speech - A system detects a speech segment that may include unvoiced, fully voiced, or mixed voice content. The system includes a digital converter that converts a time-varying input signal into a digital-domain signal. A window function passes signals within a programmed aural frequency range while substantially blocking signals above and below the programmed aural frequency range when multiplied by an output of the digital converter. A frequency converter converts the signals passing within the programmed aural frequency range into a plurality of frequency bins. A background voice detector estimates the strength of a background speech segment relative to the noise of selected portions of the aural spectrum. A noise estimator estimates a maximum distribution of noise to an average of an acoustic noise power of some of the plurality of frequency bins. A voice detector compares the strength of a desired speech segment to a criterion based on an output of the background voice detector and an output of the noise estimator. | 09-18-2008 |
20080226110 | MICROPHONE SHIELD SYSTEM - A microphone shield system captures sound in adverse conditions. The system includes a microphone positioned within a membrane. The membrane is inflated around the microphone to form an enclosure. The inflated membrane passes signals within a selected frequency range. The membrane may block or attenuate signals above and/or below the frequency range to pass a desired sound with little surrounding interference. | 09-18-2008 |