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Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

cnx-software.com

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Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#41

Post by londons_explore »

walrus01 wrote: post #30

the 3kbps example here with the 'bread with chocolate filling inside' video is frankly amazing, how good it is compared to the original. https://ai.googleblog.com/2021/02/lyra-new-very-low-bitrate-... It is unfortunate that for now this appears to be proprietary, closed source and being treated as a google competitive advantage over others, unlike opus which is fully open.

If they add it to WebRTC as they suggest, it will get auto-included in nearly all videoconferencing applications (most use webrtc under the covers, and a simple git pull will get it included in the next release).

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#42

Post by marcodiego »

motiejus wrote: post #8

Nothing about licensing or patents. I assume the worst (read: unusable for small businesses)? 10+ years ago I worked in a small voip shop, where we had very high quality (low jitter), but low bandwidth connection. I researched many codecs of the time (2010-ish). We liked speex, because it can be used "without strings attached". Also, I can choose the quality depending on the bandwidth. Although for low bandwidth g729…

With good enough licensing it could possibly replace speex.

It is sad that we have to think about licensing and patents of technologies instead of only how good or advanced they are.

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#44

Post by 1996 »

motiejus wrote: post #8

Nothing about licensing or patents. I assume the worst (read: unusable for small businesses)? 10+ years ago I worked in a small voip shop, where we had very high quality (low jitter), but low bandwidth connection. I researched many codecs of the time (2010-ish). We liked speex, because it can be used "without strings attached". Also, I can choose the quality depending on the bandwidth. Although for low bandwidth g729…

> Nothing about licensing or patents. I assume the worst (read: unusable for small businesses)?

If there's a free software implementation, and a company offering the service based in the EU (or shop around and find any other jurisdiction where software patents don't matter), it's often YOLO - but call that "legal arbitrage" if you want to sound fancy :)

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#45

Post by reaperducer »

rectang wrote: post #39

What I want to know is whether Lyra takes any longer to encode than the alternatives. Because as far as I can tell, nobody cares in the slightest about latency. Phone calls are getting to be like writing postcards to each other. Speak in a whole paragraph. Wait several seconds for the latency to clear. Then the other party responds with a whole paragraph, waits several seconds for the latency to clear... Improvements…

I had the pleasure of using a real landline just before the pandemic. Honest wire-to-wire connection between two ranches, so no silly VOIP steps between.

It was fantastic.

You don't appreciate how much latency is destroying our ability to communicate verbally until you go back to the old way.

One example is arguing. It's no wonder people used to be able to argue with one another on a telephone. You could raise your voice and still hear the other side and adjust your speech in real time. Today it's just one party shouting over the other to drown the opponent out.

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#46

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

rectang wrote: post #39

What I want to know is whether Lyra takes any longer to encode than the alternatives. Because as far as I can tell, nobody cares in the slightest about latency. Phone calls are getting to be like writing postcards to each other. Speak in a whole paragraph. Wait several seconds for the latency to clear. Then the other party responds with a whole paragraph, waits several seconds for the latency to clear... Improvements…

Just disable VoIP or disconnect from WiFi.

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#47

Post by tyingq »

lxgr wrote: post #14
tyingq wrote: post #3

If the demos are actually representative, it does seem impressive. Could save a lot of bandwidth for VoiP if it replaced 8kb/s G729.

Isn‘t VoIP at such low data rates already dominated by the overhead of UDP, IP and whatever lower layer? Multiplexing it with a low-bandwidth video stream would be possible, though. I was thinking this could be most relevant for something like digital wireless transmissions.

G.729 is 21-30kbps with transport overhead, depending on a few factors. So shaving off 5kbps would still be meaningful. Or better quality at the same bandwidth might enable in-band DTMF or fax, neither works on G.729 now.

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#48

Post by bscphil »

motiejus wrote: post #8

Nothing about licensing or patents. I assume the worst (read: unusable for small businesses)? 10+ years ago I worked in a small voip shop, where we had very high quality (low jitter), but low bandwidth connection. I researched many codecs of the time (2010-ish). We liked speex, because it can be used "without strings attached". Also, I can choose the quality depending on the bandwidth. Although for low bandwidth g729…

These days the correct comparison would be to Opus, which is similarly unencumbered and performs fantastically at low bitrates (and has a speech specific mode for even lower bitrates, because it's a hybrid of two codecs). It's also extremely low latency, so there's now no reason to accept trade-offs. (For the same bitrate as alaw/ulaw, you can get high quality full band music with Opus.)

These days it's more or less the standard for realtime voice. WebRTC uses it, most of the popular realtime voice applications use it as well, as does Signal.

Re: Lyra audio codec enables high-quality voice calls at 3 kbps bitrate

#49

Post by chrisseaton »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #46
rectang wrote: post #39

What I want to know is whether Lyra takes any longer to encode than the alternatives. Because as far as I can tell, nobody cares in the slightest about latency. Phone calls are getting to be like writing postcards to each other. Speak in a whole paragraph. Wait several seconds for the latency to clear. Then the other party responds with a whole paragraph, waits several seconds for the latency to clear... Improvements…

Just disable VoIP or disconnect from WiFi.

Isn't the actual phone network packet-switched and running over fibre optics now anyway? I don't think you can get a literally analog phone call anymore can you?
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