Personal sound zones: Delivering interface-free audio to multiple listeners

Terence Betlehem, Wen Zhang, Mark A. Poletti, Thushara D. Abhayapala

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

192 Scopus citations

Abstract

Sound rendering is increasingly being required to extend over certain regions of space for multiple listeners, known as personal sound zones, with minimum interference to listeners in other regions. In this article, we present a systematic overview of the major challenges that have to be dealt with for multizone sound control in a room. Sound control over multiple zones is formulated as an optimization problem, and a unified framework is presented to compare two state-of-the-art sound control techniques. While conventional techniques have been focusing on point-to-point audio processing, we introduce a wave-domain sound field representation and active room compensation for sound pressure control over a region of space. The design of directional loudspeakers is presented and the advantages of using arrays of directional sources are illustrated for sound reproduction, such as better control of sound fields over wide areas and reduced total number of loudspeaker units, thus making it particularly suitable for establishing personal sound zones.

Original languageEnglish
Article number7038252
Pages (from-to)81-91
Number of pages11
JournalIEEE Signal Processing Magazine
Volume32
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Mar 2015
Externally publishedYes

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