Patent ID: 8886343

Claim:
A sound processing system comprising: a plurality of sound emitting and collecting apparatuses, each of which includes a sound collecting section, a sound emitting section, and an acoustic coupling suppressing section; and communication lines serially connecting the plurality of sound emitting and collecting apparatuses together so that the plurality of sound emitting and collecting apparatuses communicate with each other via-a multi-channel communication protocol, wherein one of the plurality of sound emitting and collecting apparatuses is set as a master sound emitting and collecting apparatus, and the other apparatuses remaining among the plurality of sound emitting and collecting apparatuses are set as slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses, wherein the master sound emitting and collecting apparatus produces a synchronization signal and outputs the synchronization signal to each of the slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses, wherein the sound collecting section of each of the slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses produces a collection sound signal in synchronization with the synchronization signal, wherein the master sound emitting and collecting apparatus acquires the collection sound signal from each of the slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses, executes acoustic coupling suppressing process to the acquired collection sound signal by the acoustic coupling suppressing section to produce a sound emitting signal, and then outputs the sound emitting signal to each of the slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses, and wherein the sound emitting section of each of the slave sound emitting and collecting apparatuses emits the sound emitting signal output by the master sound emitting and collecting apparatus in synchronization with the synchronization signal.