AK Lingo

ozmoid

Lunatic Member
OK, what do all those cryptic acronyms MEAN, anyways?

BPC
Black Plastic Crap. Usually refers to 1980's (and later) era receivers; light on weight, performance, and looks. Not all BPC is Black, and not all Black receivers are BPC. The Yamaha A-1 is an example of a heavy, fabulous sounding piece of gear that happens to be black in color.

WAF (or W.A.F.)
Wife Approval Factor. :smoke: Play your cards right, get her hooked on good sounding gear, and this will never be an issue. Or, you could refuse to replace your grill cloth with something that matches the living room curtains, and be up against this for the rest of your life. Usually comes into play when your gear collection begins to exceed your storage space, or when you want to put something that's ugly, but sounds great, in a main room of your house.

VTF
Vertical Tracking Force. Refers to the "downforce", in grams, of your stylus resting in the groove of a vinyl LP.

SRA
Stylus Rake Angle. The angle at which your stylus rests in the groove. Not all turntables can adjust for this.

TOTL, MOTL, or BOTL
Top Of The Line, Middle Of The Line, or Bottom Of The Line. Refers to where your particular model of *whatever* fell in the manufacturer's line-up that year.

VC
Voice Coil. A wire coil inside a speaker that is electrified by your amps' signal to create the magnetic field that moves the cone in and out, making sound waves. If this is broken, your speaker will not work... and you will be learning lots and lots of new things (as well as new words) when you try to replace it.
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Anybody else got one (or more) to add? Try to keep them specific to AK! What have you learned since you've been here?



:nerd:
 
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AFAIK = As far as I know
IIRC = If I recall correctly

Both of these are nice if you're not 100% sure of your info... Which pretty much describes everything I post.
 
SWMBO=She Who Must Be Obeyed :tears:

PAF (or) P.A.F.=Parental Acceptance Factor

IMO=In My Opinion

IMHO-In My Humble Opinion
 
BITD

Back in the day - A term occasionally used by us older folks to refer to "the old days".
 
BTW
By the way

YMMV
Your Mileage May Vary-a variation of IMO.

WTAK
Welcome To AK!
 
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It's not an acronym, but there is something that has its place in any presentation of AK vernacular/jargon. Known only to the long-term AK cognoscenti, too esoteric and arcane to be directly defined in an open thread today, nevertheless one feels compelled to give a quiet mention to... racooning woogers ! :banana:

Like the secret handshake that must be earned, if you dig deeply enough into the archives and so prove yourself deserving, all will be revealed and you, too, will know what it truly means to racoon a wooger!

:D
 
Sure there's a "laughter" smilie, but many of us still insist on using LOL (caps optional). On the other hand... (oops, better make that OTOH)
 
RAW - Racoon A Wooger. There. :D

VTA - Vertical tracking angle, commonly meaning whether or not your tonearm is running uphill, downhill or level, but technically referring to the vertical angle at which the stylus meets the groove.

SPL - Sound pressure level, or measure of a speaker's sensitivity. Some speakers are 'louder' than others, or require less power to reach the same volume. Measured in decibels one foot from the speaker with a one watt input.
 
Truly an AK thing though not an acronym; "Unobtanium", meaning a part that is no longer obtainable.
 
IBTL - In Before the Lock - when the thread is clearly going into the toilet and you want to put your post in :banana:

DNFTT - Do Not Feed The Trolls - I made it up, but WTF!!!!, why not:D

PW - Post Whore (self explanatory)
 
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