I don't think AWE32 has been emulated yet?

Not sure if anything can currently emulate Windows Sound System (WSS). I mean for DOS games, since using WSS can give you improved sound quality even over SB16 in some rare cases. Turrican 2 is one such example:

Also, some older Sierra games have buggy Sound Blaster drivers, while their WSS driver works flawlessly.

Shponglefan wrote on 2026-01-01, 21:48:

I don't think AWE32 has been emulated yet?

Hi! Um, I *think* PCem v17 has it. It's under options menu for SB16, I think.
Years ago I had the emu8k wave font of an AWE dumped because of it, I vaguely remember.

My first sound card, the Pro AudioSpectrum 16, is being emulated by latest 86Box, too, I believe.
I vaguely remember seeing it listed in MacBox front-end. Haven't tried using it, though.

What's still missing is the Rainbow Art's SoundMan, maybe.
It's an AdLib clone with some Covox DAC. A few games support the DAC on its special i/o port address.
Rainbow Arts Soundman ? Adlib Clone - can it play Digital Sound ?

Edit: I wonder if the Ensoniq Soundscape S-2000 is being emulated by now.
So far, the only way to get support for it was using an emulation TSR.
It emulated the DAC only, on a Ensoniq AudioPCI 3000..
Re: Games that sound best with GUS?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ensoniq_Soundscape_S-2000

Edit: Two other less common soundcards that come to mind..
The MediaTrix Pro, an OPL4 soundcard with wavetable RAM. The TerraTec EWS 64 XL.
Because both were directly supported in MOD4Win, besides the GUS (samples were played by the soundcard).

Edit: The real WSS card by Microsoft would been awesome to have in emulated form! 😃
It allowed 48 KHz sampling rate before the others did.

Jo22 wrote on Yesterday, 00:41:

What's still missing is the Rainbow Art's SoundMan, maybe.
It's an AdLib clone with some Covox DAC. A few games support the DAC on its special i/o port address.

If there's any value in emulating Covox Sound Master Plus / Rainbow Arts Soundman, then any emulator with Adlib and direct-DAC support is ready to do it - just change the DAC address from 378h to 22Fh.

Grzyb wrote on Yesterday, 00:57:

If there's any value in emulating Covox Sound Master Plus / Rainbow Arts Soundman, then any emulator with Adlib and direct-DAC support is ready to do it - just change the DAC address from 378h to 22Fh.

Thank you, that makes sense! ^^
I do imagine it's basically a SpeechThing on a custom port address, after all!

I just hope that it will have its own entry, once. Would be sort a cool! 😎
It would also allow simulating the correct volume ratio between DAC and AdLib, maybe.

But I'm thinking out loud, merely.

Let's imagine an PC emulator that emulates slightly different hardware under settings, as if it was from a different reality.
Without any mentioning of the common types in the settings!

"SoundMan" option rather than "AdLib", ESDI or SCSI HDD controller instead of IDE, "Olivetti M24" or "Plantronics" option rather than "CGA".
A plain,CP/M style "TTY", "VT-100" (Terminal) or "CRT" output for text-mode rather than MDA..
At BIOS level it would still be enough compatible to run DOS!

That would be fun to imagine, I think! ^^
Especially since it's still mostly backwards compatible with normal IBM PC software!

Thank you everybody for your quality posts! I wasn't sure that topic would be of much interest but I'm glad it did, VOGONS never disapoint 😉

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2026-01-01, 21:59:

Not sure if anything can currently emulate Windows Sound System (WSS). I mean for DOS games, since using WSS can give you improv […]
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Not sure if anything can currently emulate Windows Sound System (WSS). I mean for DOS games, since using WSS can give you improved sound quality even over SB16 in some rare cases. Turrican 2 is one such example:

Also, some older Sierra games have buggy Sound Blaster drivers, while their WSS driver works flawlessly.

Does those WSS compatible soundcards have a special sound or is this just an API thing? I'm not familiar with them.

Jo22 wrote on Yesterday, 00:41:

Shponglefan wrote on 2026-01-01, 21:48:

I don't think AWE32 has been emulated yet?

Hi! Um, I *think* PCem v17 has it. It's under options menu for SB16, I think.

You are correct. Just looked up the specs for PCem and AWE32 is listed there. That's good to know!

Couple more sound options I'm not sure are emulated is the ARIA chipset and the IBM music feature card / Yamaha FB-01.

I don't believe A3D 2.0 is emulated either.

Jonas-fr wrote on Yesterday, 17:02:

Does those WSS compatible soundcards have a special sound or is this just an API thing? I'm not familiar with them.

Not sure, WSS support was usually supplied by one of the chips from Analog Devices.

Many non-Creative cards from the mid '90s supported that standard. Usually those made by OPTi, Yamaha, Crystal and Aztech.

Jonas-fr wrote on Yesterday, 17:02:

Does those WSS compatible soundcards have a special sound or is this just an API thing?

WSS supports up to 48000 Hz, while ISA Sound Blasters are limited to 44100 Hz.

I don't know if anybody can actually hear the difference - I can only suspect that with a 48 kHz content, downsampling it to 44.1 may be noticable...