Apple Inc.

Hanchi Chen

Esge Brandt Andersen

Vladan Bajic

Tom-Davy W Saux

Yang Lu

Sarthak Khanal

Baptiste Pierre Paquier

Andrew E Greenwood

Jarrett B Lagler

Thanh Phong Hua

Raghavendra S Prabhu

Priyanka Venkatesh

Jason Joseph LeBlanc

Thomas M Jensen

Brian D Clark

Victoria Chiu

Scott Charles Grinker

Benjamin A Cousins

Andrew P Bright

Vasu Iyengar

Dana C Massie

Navneet Gandhi

Martin Kuster

Robert Chun

Disclosed are systems and methods for adaptive noise cancellation (ANC) at a virtual microphone located at the eardrum of a wearer of an earphone. The techniques estimate the level of leakiness of ambient noise in the earphone from the magnitude of the gain of the transfer function of the feed forward loop filter of the ANC. Based on the estimated leakiness, the techniques estimate the transfer function of the feed forward loop filter to compensate for the difference in the effect of noise cancellation at the virtual microphone and error microphone. A bias term that represents the difference in the frequency response of the attenuated noise at the virtual and error microphone may be added to the adaptive feed forward algorithm. The ANC operation may apply the bias term to the adaptive feed forward loop filter to reduce the ambient noise at the eardrum rather than at the error microphone.

Adaptive virtual microphone for earbuds

An in-ear electronic device comprising: an enclosure that defines an enclosed space surrounding a microphone and an acoustic opening to an ambient environment surrounding the enclosure; an acoustic pathway having a first end that opens to the acoustic opening and a second end that opens to the microphone; and a protective membrane positioned between the second end of the acoustic channel and the microphone.

Acoustic vent and protective membrane

A method performed by an in-ear headphone. Coupled to the in-ear headphone is a first ear tip that is inserted into an ear canal of a user. The method obtains an audio signal from an audio source device paired with the in-ear headphone and uses the signal to drive a speaker of the headphone to output a sound into the ear canal. The method obtains a microphone signal that is responsive to the outputted sound. The method notifies the user to replace the first ear tip with a second ear tip in response to a parameter associated with the microphone signal being less than a threshold.

Acoustic detection of in-ear headphone fit

An in-ear electronic device comprising: an enclosure that defines an enclosed space surrounding a driver and an acoustic vent to an ambient environment surrounding the enclosure; and an acoustic frame having an outer surface coupled to the enclosure and defining an acoustic channel between a back volume chamber of the driver to the acoustic vent.

An ear cup housing has several reference microphones, an error microphone and a speaker. A processor drives the speaker for acoustic noise cancellation and transparency, by processing the microphone signals, and performs an oversight process by adjusting the reference microphone signals in response to detecting wind noise events and scratch events. In another aspect, the ear cup housing has an outside face that is joined to an inside face by a perimeter and the reference microphones are on the perimeter. Other aspects are also described and claimed.

Headphone with multiple reference microphones ANC and transparency

A deformable ear tip comprising: an annular inner ear tip body having a sidewall extending between first and second opposing ends thereby defining a sound channel through the ear tip; an annular outer flange integrally formed with and surrounding the first end of the inner ear tip body and extending towards the inner ear tip second end forming an air gap between the annular inner ear tip body and the annular outer flange along a portion of a length of the ear tip, wherein the outer flange comprises a first material having a first durometer and is sized and shaped to be inserted into a human ear canal; and an inner flange integrally formed with the inner ear tip body and comprising a second material having a second durometer less than the first durometer, the inner flange body extending from a location along the inner ear tip body between the first and second ends towards an inner surface of the outer flange body.

Ear tip for portable wireless listening device

A method performed by an in-ear headphone that includes a speaker and an internal microphone. The method receives a microphone signal from the internal microphone that indicates a current sound pressure level (SPL) in an ear canal of a user. The current SPL is a result of a control leak from the in-ear headphone into an ambient environment that reduces a SPL in the ear canal between 2 dB and 25 dB at a frequency within a frequency range than if otherwise not present. The method determines an active noise cancellation (ANC) filter based on the microphone signal and generates an anti-noise signal using the ANC filter. The method drives the speaker using the anti-noise signal to reduce the current SPL in the ear canal of the user as much as 25 dB at a frequency within the frequency range.

Feedback acoustic noise cancellation tuning

Headphone with multiple reference microphones and oversight of ANC and transparency

A method performed by an audio system that includes a headset with a left headset housing and a right headset housing. The method includes driving a speaker of the left headset housing with an audio signal, determining whether audio howl is present within the left headset housing by comparing spectral content from a first error microphone signal produced by a first error microphone of the left headset housing and spectral content from a second error microphone signal produced by a second error microphone of the right headset housing, and, in response to determining that audio howl is present, filtering the audio signal to mitigate the audio howl.

Method and system for detecting and mitigating audio howl in headsets

A method for audio signal processing of microphone signals of a headphone. An audio signal from a first microphone of a headphone is filtered by an ANC system to produce a first filtered signal. Dynamic range control is performed upon the first filtered signal to produce a first dynamic range adjusted signal that drives a speaker of the headphone. Other aspects are also described and claimed.

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San Jose, CA, United States of America

Hanchi Chen