HANDLING VARIABLE DELAY IN OBJECTIVE SPEECH QUALITY ASSESSMENT

A speech quality estimation technique that employs an arbitrary, speech quality estimation algorithm. The speech quality estimation technique analyzes a reference speech signal and a test speech signal, and based on this analysis, identifies the level of continuous delay variation, if any, and the location of and size of any intermittent delay variations along the test signal. The reference speech signal and/or the test speech signal are adjusted to account for continuous delay variation and intermittent delay variations, such that the reference speech signal and the test signal are similarly scaled with respect to the time domain. The reference speech signal and the test speech signal are then compared for the purpose of generating a speech quality estimation. The resulting speech quality estimation is then adjusted based on the level of continuous delay variation and any intermittent delay variations.