Multiband linear predictive speech coding at very low bit rates

The authors describe the multiband linear predictive (MB-LPC) vocoder and its operation at 2.4 kb/s and 1.2 kb/s. The MB-LPC vocoder uses mixed excitation and exploits the advantages of both time and frequency domain speech coding techniques to produce natural sounding, good quality speech. Subjective performance of speech at 2.4 kb/s produced by the MB-LPC is very close to that for the 4.15 kb/s INMARSAT-M IMBE speech coder. Informal listening tests have shown that in most cases people could not tell the difference between the new 2.4 kb/s MB-LPC coder and the 4.15 kb/s INMARSAT-M IMBE coder