Teaching practical hands-on DSP with MATLAB and the C31 DSK

A graphically oriented MATLAB program, written by the authors, facilitates teaching real-world DSP concepts such as quantization of digital filter coefficients that occur in fixed-point processors. While many universities own or plan to buy, the inexpensive floating-point TMS320C31 DSKs for pedagogical reasons, this MATLAB program fully supports that decision by allowing filter coefficient quantization effects to be demonstrated using either fixed-point or floating point filtering algorithms on a single DSP device. This program eliminates the need to purchase expensive specialized software programs or additional DSP hardware. The program described in this paper provides an interactive graphical user interface, which communicates directly with the DSK, and demonstrates in real-time how both coefficient quantization and filter implementation affect filter performance. All of this is accomplished without the need for tedious programming of the DSK. The latest version of the software allows the floating-point TMS320C31 to directly implement the fixed-point filtering algorithm. .This enhancement represents a considerable cost and time saving for both the student and professor since only one Type of digital signal processor is required.