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theory of probable cause One possible reason why something is not working; a guess.

thermal compound Paste-like material with very high heat-transfer properties. Applied between the CPU and the cooling device, it ensures the best possible dispersal of heat from the CPU. Also called heat dope.

thermal printer Printers that use heated printheads to create high-quality images on special or plain paper.

thermal unit Combination heat sink and fan designed for BTX motherboards; blows hot air out the back of the case instead of just into the case.

thread Smallest logical division of a single program.

throttling Power reduction/thermal control capability allowing CPUs to slow down during low activity or high heat build-up situations. Intel’s version is known as SpeedStep, AMD’s as PowerNow!

throw Size of the image a projector displays at a certain distance from the screen.

TIA/EIA Telecommunications Industry Alliance/Electronic Industries Alliance. Trade organization that provides standards for network cabling and other electronics;.

tiers Levels of Internet providers, ranging from the Tier 1 backbones to Tier 3 regional networks.

timbre Qualities that differentiate the same note played on different instruments.

toner A fine powder made up of plastic particles bonded to iron particles, used by laser printers to create text and images.

toner cartridge Object used to store the toner in a laser printer. (See also laser printer, toner.)

touchpad Flat, touch-sensitive pad that serves as a pointing device for most laptops.

touch screen Monitor with a type of sensing device across its face that detects the location and duration of contact, usually by a finger or stylus.

TRACERT Command-line utility used to follow the path a packet takes between two hosts. Also called TRACEROUTE.

traces Small electrical connections embedded in a circuit board.

track Area on a hard drive platter where data is stored. A group of tracks with the same diameter is called a cylinder.

trackball Pointing device distinguished by a ball that is rolled with the fingers.

TrackPoint IBM’s pencil eraser-sized joystick used in place of a mouse on laptops.

transfer corona Thin wire, usually protected by other thin wires, that applies a positive charge to the paper during the laser printing process, drawing the negatively charged toner particles off of the drum and onto the paper.

transparency (Windows Vista Aero) Effect in the Aero desktop environment that makes the edges of windows transparent.

triad Group of three phosphors—red, green, blue—in a CRT.

Trojan Program that does something other than what the user who runs the program thinks it will do.

troubleshooting theory Steps a technician uses to a solve a problem: identify the problem, establish a theory of probable cause, test the theory, establish a plan of action, verify functionality, and document findings.

TV tuner Typically an add-on device that allows users to watch television on a computer.

TWAIN (technology without an interesting name) Programming interface that enables a graphics application, such as a desktop publishing program, to activate a scanner, frame grabber, or other image-capturing device.

UAC (User Account Control) Windows Vista feature that enables Standard accounts to do common tasks and provides a permissions dialog when Standard and Administrator accounts do certain things that could potentially harm the computer (such as attempt to install a program).

UART (universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter) Device that turns serial data into parallel data. The cornerstone of serial ports and modems.

UDF (universal data format) Replaced the ISO-9660 formats, allowing any operating system and optical drive to read UDF formatted disks.

UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) Consortium of companies that established the UEFI standard that replaced the original EFI standard.

Ultra DMA Hard drive technology that enables drives to use direct memory addressing. Ultra DMA mode 3 drives—called ATA/33—have data transfer speeds up