ATSC
Advanced Television Standards Committee -- industry group formed
to standardize advanced television (DTV) in the United States and
the 8VSB transmition system they established
ATV
Advanced Television -- an early name for digital television
COFDM
Coded Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing -- the European
DTV standard, transmitting many streams of data simultaneously in
a tiny space
HDTV
High Definition Television -- the highest quality of picture available
in digital television. HDTV is one presentation format in DTV. In
the United States, two HDTV formats are 1080i and 720p, both of
which include 5.1 channels of surround sound audio and are displayed
in a 16:9 aspect ratio
JPEG
Joint Picture Experts Group -- a digital compression scheme for
still pictures
MPEG
Motion Picture Experts Group -- a digital compression scheme for
video and moving pictures
NTSC
National Television Standards Committee -- the analog television
system currently in use in the United States, often humorously referred
to as the “Never-Twice-the-Same-Color” system
SDTV
Standard Definition Television -- digital television formats that
don’t achieve the quality of HDTV, but are still better than
NTSC pictures. The twelve SDTV formats all feature surround sound
audio and may be viewed in either 16:9 or 4:3 aspect ratios
VSB
Vestigial Side-band -- the analog modulation system currently used
in NTSC broadcasting and cable
8VSB
Eight (discrete amplitude level) Vestigial Side-band transmition
system used to carry the new U.S. digital standard
4:3
Aspect ratio of the NTSC TV screen, with a four unit width corresponding
to a three unit height proportionally, regardless of the actual
TV screen size
16:9
Aspect ratio of widescreen DTV formats for all HDTV and some SDTV
video. Sixteen unit width corresponding to a nine unit height proportionally,
regardless of the actual TV screen size