TRANSMISSION PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF VOICE ENCODING TECHNOLOGY FOR THE INMARSAT MINI-M SYSTEM

In this paper are presented the method and results of a subjective eva luation, which was conducted in order to select a new speech codec for the Inmarsat mini-M system. The mini-M system is designed to provide the next generation of global, notebook-sized satellite terminals for transportable, land-mobile and maritime voice, facsimile, and data com munications. Overall, six different codecs operating at a combined sou rce and channel rate of 4.8 kbit/s were evaluated in a series of six s ubjective tests. From this, it was concluded that one codec was able t o deliver performance that is equivalent to, or better than, the IS-54 full-rate ditigal cellular 8 kbit/s VSELP codec, and was selected for use in the mini-M system.