Low Pass Equiripple FIR Filters.
Cuthbert Nyack
In the applet below, the approach developed by Remez and Parks-McClellan is used and is described in Digital Filter Designer's
Handbook by C. Rorabaugh published by McGraw Hill.
Only odd length filters can be derived with the applets here.
In this method an iterative approach is used to find the location of the frequencies
at which the extrema occur. From this, the frequency response is generated and the impulse response found by taking the inverse DFT
of the sampled frequency response. The final result depends on the
assumptions made about the shape of the transition band response.
In the applet below, one sets the pass band edge Fp(58)(this notation means that Fp is set by scrollbar 58), the stop band
edge Fs(59), the ratio of pass band to stop band ripple RR(62) and the attenuation
in the stop band in dB dB(56).
The total number of extrema and the number in the passband is then
guessed (applet on previous page can be used as a guide) and the extrema frequencies (magenta) adjusted by the scrollbars
until they coincide with the error extrema (yellow). The error is
the difference between the filter response and the ideal filter
response. The maths used here to calculate the error from the extrema
frequencies was taken from Digital Filter Designer's
Handbook by C. Rorabaugh published by McGraw Hill.
If the stop band
attenuation is satisfactory then the extrema frequencies have been found (pink).
If not then one has to restart with a different number of extrema.
'eG(45)' is the error gain and 'Gd(51)' is the grid density.
Although this interactive approach can be slow compared to using
software to locate the frequency extrema, it can better illustrate
how equirippability arises.
One half of the symmetric Impulse response is shown in orange and for verification, the
frequency response derived from the impulse response is shown as blue
magenta. This curve is shifted downwards to avoid to much overlap
with the green one obtained from the frequency extrema. The frequency response in the transition regionis not calculated when
locating the extrema and this region is plotted as a straight line. If calculated in the transition region, the green curve is the same as the blue magenta one.
This approach is optimal in the sense that it produces a filter with the
minimum number of taps that can achieve the desired characteristics.
In the applet, the error gain (scrollbar(57)) should first be set
at a low value where the error is visible but not too large. The
frequency extrema, starting with the ones near the band edges, should then be moved to produce approximate equiripples.
The numbers next to the frequency extrema indicate the scrollbar which
moves that extrema. As the applet opens the scroillbars 7 and 8 control the extrema
at the edges. The scrollbars controlling the extrema at the band edges and at half the sampling frequency are shown in red. Adjustment should first be made by moving down scrollbar 6 by clicking on the down arrow. This moves the extrema next to the edge of the pass band to the right. Scrollbar 9 should then then be reduced by clicking on the up arrow to move the extrema next to the edge of the stop band to the left. Adjustment should then be made to the other extrema to get approximate equiripples across both bands.
In this first
step the frequency extrema may appear to be at the zeros of the error rather than the extrema. However this situation should correct
itself after approximate equiripple error is obtained across
both the pass and stop bands. The error gain
can then be increased and the proceedure repeated until a
satisfactory result is obtained.
Sudden large movements in one of
the frequency extrema can lead to a situation that can be difficult
to retrieve. When that happens, it may be better to restart the
applet by reloading the page.
It is possible to get the frequency and error extrema aligned without
equiripple behaviour, usually this occurs when a larger ripple
occurs at 0 or at half the sampling
frequency. When that happens, the number of extrema in the
offending band should be increased by 1.
One possibility is shown by the gif image below.
In this case, the stop band attenuation is measured by adjusting
scrollbar 56 until the horizontal dark red line sits just above the
maxima in the stop band. The attenuation is then shown by dB(56) = 72.00dB.
The pass band is from 0 to Fp(58)ws =
0.2ws.
The stop band is from Fs(59)ws = 0.25ws to
0.5ws.
The total number of extrema Te(60) is 42, the number of
extrema in the pass band Pe(61) is 25 and the number of
extrema in the stop band is Te(60) - Pe(61) = 17.
The ratio of the pass band ripple to the stop band ripple
RR(62) is 25.0.
The number of grid points per extrema Gd(63) = 16.0.
The number of taps required to realize the filter is Ntap = 81.
Notice the alignmemt of the frequency extrema (magenta) with
the extrema of the error (yellow). Once this alignment is achieved,
then the resulting filter has equiripple characteristics and the
impulse response shown in orange can be used to realize the filter.
When the error gain is adjusted by scrollbar 57 to make the ripple amplitude equal to 1div(50 pixels) then the error gain is shown by
eG(57) ~ 213796 and
the stop band ripple is 50/eG(57) ~ 50/213796 ~ 0.000233 and
the pass band ripple is 0.000233 x RR(62) = 0.000233 x 25 ~ 0.00584.
The example shows extrema at 0, 0.5ws and at the pass band and stop band edges. This applet always shows extrema at the pass band and stop band
edges but not always at 0 or 0.5ws.
The following image shows the filter obtained with the applet using the starting parameters Fp = 0.2, Fs = 0.28, Te = 19, Pe = 8.
In the case the number of extrema in the stop band is reduced from 11 to 10. Equiripple behaviour is still observed with a smaller attenuation in the stop band.
Below the number of extrema in the pass band is reduced from 8 to 7.
There are more extrema in the error 8 than there are frequency extrema
7 and it is impossible to get alignment in the pass band. This
behaviour makes it easier to determine the number of required extrema
in a band.
Below the number of extrema in the stop band is reduced from 11 to 9.
There are more extrema in the error than there are frequency extrema
and it is impossible to get alignment in the stop band.
Case below shows as far as is possible with this applet, a stop band
attenuation of 72dB with a transition bandwidth of 0.03. Slight variations in the error amplitude suggest that furthur refinement of some of the extrema is still
possible.
The applet below could be used to get an estimate of the length of the filter required for a particular application eg for parameters(25.0, 70.0, 0.06), applet suggest a length of ~51 or ~49.
The 2 images show for Ntap = 49 the stop band attenuation is 67dB and
for Ntap = 53, the stop band attenuation is 71dB.
N = 51 does not
give an acceptable division of extrema in the 2 bands for the given pass and stop band bandwidths.
The applets here on equiripple filters appear quite consuming at first attempt. However after a couple of successes, they become quite easy
to use.
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COPYRIGHT © 2008 Cuthbert Nyack.