What is one of the main purposes of a CODEC in digital communications?

A CODEC, which stands for coder-decoder, is fundamental in digital communications primarily because it converts signals to facilitate their transmission over various media. In the communication process, information such as audio or video needs to be formatted correctly for efficient transmission. The coding aspect of a CODEC compresses and encodes the data to reduce its size, making it suitable for transmission, while the decoding part restores it at the receiving end for playback or processing.

This conversion is crucial because it enables the efficient use of bandwidth and provides compatibility between different systems. Without a CODEC, transmitting large amounts of audio or video data in real-time would be impractical due to the limitations of available bandwidth and the potential for signal loss or degradation.

While enhancing audio quality, amplifying signals, and encrypting data are important functions in communications, they are not the primary role of a CODEC. Enhancing audio quality relates to post-processing techniques rather than the fundamental function of data conversion. Amplifying radio signals pertains to increasing signal strength, while encryption deals with securing data, neither of which directly involves the encoding and decoding processes that define a CODEC's main purpose.