According to one embodiment of the invention, a method is provided in which a first set of coefficients is generated for performing echo cancellation in a voice-over-packet (VoP) system. Each coefficient is represented by a first number of bits which includes a first portion representing the sign of the respective coefficient and a second portion representing the magnitude of the respective coefficient. The first set of coefficients is compressed to generate a second set of coefficients which requires less memory storage than the first set of coefficients, in which coefficients which have higher values are encoded before coefficients which have lower values until a predetermined compression ratio is satisfied or until all coefficients in the first set have been encoded.