Abstract: Methods and apparatus for achieving echo suppression in communications systems include an echo suppressor, referred to herein as an AC-center attenuator, which attenuates the echo component of a communications signal by multiplying a portion of the communications signal by an appropriate scale factor. Specifically, the AC-center attenuator scales that portion of the communications signal lying within a sliding attenuation window. The attenuation window tracks the communications signal so that the AC-center attenuator suppresses the echo component while passing other signal components of interest (e.g., near-end speech and noise). The scale factor within the attenuation window, and the size of the attenuation window itself, are dynamically adjusted so that the AC-center attenuator introduces minimum signal distortion and few audible artifacts. The dynamic adjustment is carried out to provide a desired round-trip echo gain in a system in which the AC-center attenuator is implemented.

Abstract: A measure of a degree of convergence in an adaptive filter arrangement is derived from the comparison of an amount of adaptation occurring in the adaptive filter arrangement, over a predetermined period of time, with a normalizing value accumulated for the same period. Supplemental signal processing may be invoked, modified or withdrawn based upon the degree of convergence indicated.

Abstract: An extended coefficient resolution range is provided in an adaptive filter arrangement by utilizing several filters, in combination, to represent the extended resolution range. The coefficients of a first filter represents a high portion of the extended range, while the coefficients of the second filter represent low portions of the extended range. The two filters operate in parallel to filter an input signal, and the outputs of the filters are combined to produce the filtered signal. A low portion of the coefficients of the first filter overlap an upper portion of the coefficients of the second filter. The coefficients of the first filter are periodically updated from the overlapping portions of the coefficients of the second filter, after which the overlapping portions of the coefficients of the second filter are reset. In accordance with another aspect of the invention, the amount of overlap may be adjusted to dynamically change the resolution range of the filter.