Digital signal processing (DSP) is concerned with the processing of digital signals or analog signals after converting from analog to digital format. DSP includes subfields like: communication signals processing, radar signal processing, sensor array processing, digital image processing, etc.
DSP is used with real-world analog signals when this will work better than analog signal processing. The first step is usually to convert the signal from an analog to a digital form, by using an analog-to-digital converter. Often, the required output signal is another real-world analog signal, which requires a digital-to-analog converter.
Digital signal processing algorithms can run on:
- General purpose microprocessors and standard computers.
- Specialized processors called digital signal processors (DSPs).
- Purpose-built hardware such as application-specific integrated circuit (ASICs) and field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs).
- Digital Signal Controllers (mostly for industrial applications such as motor control).
- Stream processing that works very well for traditional DSP or graphics processing applications (such as image, video).