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Convention Paper

Digital Dither

Authors: Lipshitz, Stanley P.; Vanderkooy, John

AES Convention 81 · Paper 2412 · November 1986

Abstract

We investigate the consequences of the rounding or truncation to a fixed word length of the output of a digital signal processor, such as a digital editor, mixer, equalizer, filter, or sampling standards converter, using fixed-point arithmetic. The signal input to the processor is assumed to be in digital form, and have been quantized with proper analog dither applied. Quantization artifacts are thus of a benign nature in the input signal, and our concern is that the arithmetical manipulations to which these digital words are subjected in the digital signal processor should not introduce any quantization distortion or noise modulation. We show that the use of appropriate digital dithering before final rounding or truncation can keep the input signal free of such degradation even when subjected to severe operations such as gain fading. The penalty is a small increase in the broadband noise level.

Details

Published in
AES Convention 81
AES Convention
81
Paper number
2412
Publication date
November 6, 1986
Session subject
Audio Recording
Affiliation
Audio Research Group, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada (See document for exact affiliation information.)
Type
Convention Paper