A high-fidelity audio device including a main microphone, a voice microphone and a process circuit. The main microphone receives sound and generates a main signal; the voice microphone perceives user's vocal vibration and produces a vocal signal; the process circuit collects the main signal and the vocal signal, superimposes and then decays the collected signals to generate a high-fidelity signal for high-definition broadcast realization.

In an approach to adaptive sound masking, one or more computer processors analyze a surrounding of one or more users and stores in a database. The one or more computer processors receive a request from the one or more users for adaptive sound masking. The one or more computer processors analyzes a surrounding environment associated with the one or more users and storing a first information associated with the surrounding environment in a database. The one or more computer processors generate a cognitive sound mask base on the first information. The one or more computer processors produce a sound cone based on the cognitive sound mask and directing the sound cone at a distracting sound. The one or more computer processors adapt the sound cone based on changes to the surrounding environment.

A sound collecting system includes a plurality of sound collecting units that collect sound and a sound collecting device. The plurality of sound collecting units send sound collection data including audio data and time data to the sound collecting device. The sound collecting device includes a processor that manages time for the plurality of sound collecting units and receives an instruction specifying a sound collecting location, and an output unit. The processor of the sound collecting device synthesizes the audio data of the plurality of sound collecting units on the basis of the time data of the plurality of sound collecting units, and outputs, from the output unit, the audio data of the sound collecting location.

Provided are methods and apparatus for enhancing a signal-to-noise ratio. In an example, provided is an apparatus configured to modify audio to better match the way the human brain processes audio by modifying the audio to a form which takes advantage of human echolocation capabilities. When humans listen to audio, they subconsciously listen for an echo and thus subconsciously focus on listening to, and for, meaningful information in audio. The focus causes humans to ignore noise in the audio, which results in enhancing a signal-to-noise ratio. In an example, the provided apparatus compensates for shortcomings of a device to which the apparatus is coupled by adjusting a respective amplitude of at least one constituent audio frequency of an output digital audio stream of the apparatus.

Methods for rendering audio for playback by two or more speakers are disclosed. The audio includes one or more audio signals, each with an associated intended perceived spatial position. Relative activation of the speakers may be a cost function of a model of perceived spatial position of the audio signals when played back over the speakers, a measure of proximity of the intended perceived spatial position of the audio signals to positions of the speakers, and one or more additional dynamically configurable functions. The dynamically configurable functions may be based on at least one or more properties of the audio signals, one or more properties of the set of speakers and/or one or more external inputs.

A noise detector and a sound signal output device are provided that can detect high accuracy various types of noise including composite noise. The noise detector (30) for detecting noise contained in an input signal (s1) includes a noise discrimination portion having a plurality of discrimination portions to which an input signal is input and a noise determination portion (35) determining noise based on individual discrimination results of the plurality of discrimination portions. The noise discrimination portion includes at least two of a frequency component discrimination portion (32) discriminating the presence or absence of noise based on a frequency component of the input signal, a temporal change discrimination portion (33) discriminating the presence or absence of noise based on a temporal change of the input signal and a high-frequency component discrimination portion (34) discriminating the presence or absence of noise based on a high-frequency component of the input signal The noise determination portion determines noise based on individual discrimination results of the plurality of discrimination portions.

Systems and methods for audio output control are disclosed. Audio may be output via a speaker of a communal device associated with a first portion of an environment. A user may provide a user utterance indicating an intent to add another device in a second portion of the environment to the audio-output session, and/or an intent to move the audio-output session from the first device to the second device, and/or an intent to remove a device from an audio-output session. Based on this determined intent, audio-session queues may be associated and dissociated from devices and device states may be altered to effectuate the intent of the user utterance.

Systems and methods are described for measuring capture performance of multiple voice signals. A first speech signal is applied to a device, and measured at far-end at a far-end of a testing environment. A second speech signal is separately applied to the device, and is also measured at the far end. The measured speech signals are added, and a quality assessment model is applied to the first far-end combined signal to obtain a first quality metric. The first speech signal and the second speech signal are then both applied at the same time to the device and measured at the far-end. The quality assessment model is applied to the second far-end combined signal to obtain a second quality metric. The quality metric for the second far-end combined signal is normalized, based on the first quality metric, to obtain a performance index for the device.

Methods a provided for improving an audio scene for people suffering from hearing loss or for adverse hearing environments. Audio objects may be prioritized. In some implementations, audio objects that correspond to dialog may be assigned to a highest priority level. Other implementations may involve assigning the highest priority to other types of audio objects, such as audio objects that correspond to events. During a process of dynamic range compression, higher-priority objects may be boosted more, or cut less, than lower-priority objects. Some lower-priority audio objects may fall below the threshold of human hearing, in which case the audio objects may be dropped and not rendered.

The present invention relates to a method of operating a hearing aid (1), comprising the steps of receiving (100; 101) ambient audio information (20) by at least one microphone (2) of the hearing aid (1), to provide an ambient audio signal (20s); and an alternative audio information (30) by at least an interface unit (3) of the hearing aid (1), to provide an alternative audio signal (30s), wherein the alternative audio information (30) is transmitted by an alternative audio source (8). The present method comprises additionally the steps of weighting the alternative audio signal (30s) and the ambient audio signal, to form a weighted alternative audio signal (110) and a weighted ambient signal (109), respectively; mixing (111) the weighted alternative audio signal and the weighted ambient audio signal to produce a combined audio signal; generating (112) an output signal based on the combined audio signal; and supplying (112) an output signal to a receiver (5) of the hearing aid (1). The weighting step further comprises determining a first weight (108) for forming the weighted alternative audio signal (110) and a second weight (106) for forming the weighted ambient signal (109), wherein the first weight and the second weight are based on a sound level difference (102, 103, 104) between the sound level of the alternative audio signal (30s) and the sound level of the ambient audio signal (20s). The present invention also relates to a hearing aid (10) configured to operate according to the above method.