Mobile spatial audio communication system

Abstract

As a first step in studying the application of the global positioning system (GPS) in a spatial audio communication system, an experimental platform was developed using commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) GPS units: a Garmin Rino 120 (Rino) and a laptop. Software running on the laptop was developed to create a spatial-audio communication system based on GPS data and the two-way radio link on the Rino units. The audio communications were rendered spatially on headsets and perceptually tested for a number of users. The perceptual results and implementation issues are discussed in this paper. The experimental platform demonstrated that COTS GPS units can be used for a real-time GPS-based spatial audio communication system, but with some limitations.