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Glossary

M
MCO

Connector with 3 or 5 wires for balanced & unbalanced Audio (i.e. PHOENIX®, captive screw).

MEGAHERTZ

Symbol= MHz, equivalent to 1 million Hertz or 106 Hertz.

MINI DIN

see DIN.

MODEM

MODulator DEModulator. Device used in telephony for bidirectional access.

MONOCHROME

Image with a single color or black & white. Nowadays, monochrome images are only used in High Resolution applications such as in Military or Medical environments.

MPEG

Motion Picture Expert Group. Process for compressing moving pictures (i.e. M.PEG2 for TV & HDTV) for transport or storage.

MPEG.2 (H.262)

Audio & Video compression algorithm.

MPEG.4 (H.264)

High efficiency compression algorithm. (MPEG & ITU group).

MOTION

see Adaptive Motion Compensation.

N
NON INTERLACED

Method of scanning all the lines of a picture (1 image = 1 frame = 1 field). E.g. for a computer working in SVGA at 800 x 600 lines, it gives 600 lines per frame. For some HDTV formats, the scanning method is the same but is called "progressive".

NAB

National Association Broadcaster.

NSCA

National Systems Contractors Association.

NTSC

National Television Standard Committee. Television standard used in North America, Japan and other parts of the world (South America and Asia). NTSC has 525 horizontal and interlaced lines refreshed at 60 fields per second. The Chrominance subcarrier is of 3.58 MHz (sometimes 4.43 MHz). See also FRAME RATE.

O
OHM

Measurement of resistance (named after Georg Simon Ohm), shown by the ½ symbol. 75 Ohms is the standard load for an RGB video signal.

OSD

On Screen Display.

OSHIDEN™

see S.Video connector.

OVERLAY

Action of cutting and mixing 2 or more video pictures onto the same display.

OVERSCAN

Opposite of UNDERSCAN. In Overscan mode, to avoid seeing the corners and the borders, the image is displayed about 8% bigger than in standard (Underscan) mode. Standard TV display mode is Overscan.