ACQUAAdvanced Communication Quality Analysis

Powerful. Versatile. User-friendly.

Measure and analyse speech quality fast and reliablyACQUA, Advanced Communication Quality Analysis, is a powerful data acquisition and analysis system from HEAD acoustics

for acoustic and/or electric transmission paths up to 24 kHz. The system includes a dual channel signal generator and a dual

channel analyzer. In combination with measurement front ends a wide range of single components, complete terminals and

transmission networks can be analyzed via fully synchronized digital in- and outputs.

The Windows® based software package allows the generation, modification and execution of measurement sequences. By means

of predefined modifiable measurement descriptors which are completely embedded and controlled by databases measurement

data can be gathered and evaluated in a simple and quick manner. ACQUA makes use of user-definable standards or standards

based on national and international telecommunication authorities such as ETSI, ITU-T, TIA, 3GPP, GCF or PTCRB. In addition to

the analysis, the innovative system documents and archives measurement data in the time and frequency domain.

One System – Numerous ApplicationsACQUA is a versatile analysis system which is used in different application areas. Thus, the system provides comprehensive speech

and audio quality investigations for:

• standard terminals (digital, analog),

• mobile phones (VoLTE, UMTS, GSM, CDMA),

• wireless phones (DECT, CAT-iqTM),

• headsets

• hands-free and conference terminals (office, vehicle, handheld),

• multimedia terminals (VoIP, VoLTE systems),

• network components (echo canceller, DCME, speech coders …) and

• speech quality measurements and optimization of algorithms and systems.

The analysis system ACQUA can also be used for quality control, conformance tests, research & development and in complex

network configurations.

View and modify measurement descriptors as requiredAll audio and telecom specific measurement methods are available in ACQUA including all major ITU-T Recommendations such

as G.122, P.64, P.79, P.340, P.502 (Appendix III) and methods described in e.g. ANSI S3.5-1997, DIN 45631, ISO 532 A/B,

ISO 3382, IEEE 269 or IEC 60268-16. In ACQUA, these standards consist of various measurement descriptors (SMDs) which

are combined to measurement sequences and which determine how the measurement data are captured and analyzed in the

time and frequency domain.

You can view the settings of the measurements descriptors anytime in a clearly structured and comprehensible form. You can also

modify the measurement descriptors and protect them against modification. In addition to that you can generate reports from the

measurement descriptors which can be edited with Microsoft® Office (alternatively: OpenOfficeTM, LibreOffice®).

Depending on the corresponding standard a big variety of measurement signals can be used in the measurement descriptors such

as sinus, sinus stepped sweep, multi-sinus, pseudo noise, artificial voice (P.50), speech, test signals according to ITU-T Rec. P.501,

e.g. Composite Source Signal (CSS) and others. Furthermore you can define, edit and import any test signals.

ACQUA – Features at a glanceThe variety of useful features underline that ACQUA is a very capable analysis system for the assessment

of speech and audio quality.

Database controlled configuration and control of tests and front endsThe configuration and control of tests and measurement front ends is completely automated and controlled by ACQUA

databases.

Intuitive control and user-friendly interfaceYou can directly start to measure and analyse, because of the intuitive control of ACQUA. Settings can be changed easy and fast

to individual need. The user interface is designed very user-friendly and thus allows efficient working.

Analysis in the time and in the frequency domainWith ACQUA also analysis, documentation and archiving of measurement data in the time and in the frequency domain are

possible. Here you can determine e.g. transmission functions, loudness ratings, echo loss, distortions, background noise and

out-of-band signals. In addition to determination of level, level vs. time and delay further analysis can be conducted.

Versatile Software for

the Analysis of

Speech and Audio Quality

Additional ACQUA features are:

Automated storage of all measurement sequences, results and reports in databases

Archiving all data on a local or network SQL server ensures integrity and reproducibility

High degree of automation and ease of use allows fast conduction of complex test suites

Open and compare several projects to each other due to the innovative database function

Creation and automatic verification of tolerance schemes

Import or export tolerance data from/to excel or text files

Digital real-time equalization of any artificial mouth

Recording of any signals via analog and digital interfaces (only with full-license and compact systems)

Acoustic real-time playback for analysis support, e.g. via headphones

Import measurement results in ACQUAlyzer or in a result diagram and export the results in Excel

Individual tailoring – Perfect solutionA variety of ACQUA options, so called ACOPT, allows the individual tailoring of the performance of the software to specific fields

of application which may range from the evaluation of frequency responses to psychoacoustic models and speech quality analysis

systems. With these ACOPTs you always have the perfect solution for your specific purpose.

Here is an overview of the ACQUA options:

Signal Generator and Editor, Signal Analysis, SLVM P.56, TOSQA, CLIP, DTMF, TBR 21, TBR 37, PESQ, Relative Approach,

ACQUA COM Remote Control, Online Analysis, Quality Pie, ES 203 021, GCF, PTCRB, Psychoacoustics SMDs, Room

Acoustics, Speech Transmission Index, SNRI & TNLR Calculation according to ITU-T G.160, ACQUA Batch Processing,

Speech-based Double Talk Analysis, Turntable Support, Speech Intelligibility Index as well as 3QUEST, EQUEST and POLQA,

which we present hereafter.

3QUEST (3-fold Quality Evaluation of Speech in Telecommunications) is an optional calculation method for ACQUA which

allows the objective speech quality evaluation of telecommunication terminals. It is based on the ETSI standards EG 202 396-3

and TS 103 106 which cover both wideband and narrowband scenarios in the presence of background noise.

This option provides a calculation method for the assessment of the echo performance of terminals based on the new hearing

model analysis EQUEST (Echo Quality Evaluation of Speech in Telecommunications). Both narrowband and wideband scenarios

can be evaluated with EQUEST.

POLQA (Perceptual Objective Listening Quality Analysis) provides a calculation method for determining MOS values (Mean Opinion

Scores) according to. This option is a speech quality testing technology for fixed, mobile and IP based networks. It was standardized

by the ITU-T as Recommendation P.863, and can be applied for speech quality analysis of HD Voice, 3G and 4G/LTE networks.

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