Technosaurus
CNET UK's guide to all the must-know terms and evolving technologies
- AAC (Advanced Audio Coding)
- Audio compression scheme defined under the MPEG-2 standard > More
- AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port)
- Graphics bus slot from Intel that connects graphics memory with main memory > More
- AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format)
- Uncompressed audio format from Apple > More
- ALiS (alternate lighting of surfaces)
- Technology for plasma displays that allows higher native resolution than designs with discrete pixels > More
- ANSI (American National Standards Institute)
- Organisation of US industry groups that develops standards to facilitate trade and telecommunications > More
- ANSI lumens
- Light-output specification used to measure brightness of front-projection TVs > More
- ATRAC
- Audio compression algorithm most commonly used by MiniDisc players > More
- ATRAC3 (Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding 3)
- Compressed audio format -- successor of ATRAC > More
- AU
- Sound file format used by Unix computers > More
- ActiveX
- Set of technologies based on Microsoft's Component Object Model > More
- Adobe Acrobat
- Software that lets you create electronic documents that look like an original > More
- access point
- Hardware that enables wireless devices to connect to a local-area network > More
- active matrix
- Type of flat-panel display -- also known as a TFT display > More
- alpha channel
- Type of control over bit attributes in computer graphics applications > More
- analogue
- Continuous waveform, such as that used in broadcast television or AM/FM radio > More
- analogue-to-digital conversion
- Process by which an analogue signal is changed into a digital signal > More
- anamorphic
- Process of compressing wide-screen images to fit the standard 4:3 television signal > More
- anamorphic downconversion
- Process of converting the image from an anamorphic DVD for display on a standard 4:3 TV > More
- anamorphic squeeze
- See vertical compression > More
- aperture
- Opening behind camera lens through which light passes to make a photographic exposure > More
- aperture grille
- Wires stretched vertically down the inside of a monitor to mask beams from electron guns at the back of the tube > More
- artefact
- Chunks of stray pixels/speckles that don't belong in computer graphics/scanned pictures > More
- aspect ratio
- Ratio of width to height in a video picture or other graphic image > More
- audio compression
- Way of bringing lowest and highest volume levels of a song closer together > More
Special Offers from our Sponsors
In Digital Living
Enter our competitions to win great prizes!
Visit our Win Things page in Digital Living and enter CNET.co.uk's free competitions for your chance to kit yourself out with some fantastic tech goodies...
Format wars: The tech that should have won
Did you love Laserdisc? Were you bonkers over Betamax? Travel back in time with Captain Tech and check out the format losers that should have triumphed
