Inter-channel de-correlation for perceptual audio coding

Sound reproduction is evolving towards multi-channel systems with a growing number of channels. Consequently, high quality multi-channel codecs are required. Last generation perceptual audio codecs, represented by MPEG advanced audio coder (AAC), can efficiently code typical surround multi-channel material but may benefit from a previous block of inter-channel de-correlation, for certain audio recordings. These recordings present high correlation between non-symmetric channels, or correspond to loudspeaker arrangements different from surround, such as linear loudspeaker arrays. In order to valuate the advantages of this new coding approach, a multi-channel perceptual quality measure is developed.