inside dosbox type before starting zone66.exe
ems off
xms off

(so

1mount c c:\somelocation
2c:
3cd zone66
4ems off
5xms off
6zone66

Great, it works now, thanks! Only one problem left, there's no sound effects or music. Why is that?

Try configuring it with setup.exe or install.exe, the values are irq=7 dma=1
for sb16 (see dosbox.conf)

I've got sound effects in-game to work by disabling GUS support and running the game with ZONE66 /S, but there is still no music. Zone66 doesn't have a setup program and the Helpme.exe tells me that you need to use command line switches to configure the sound.

Zone 66 is a very, very picky game. It must be run with nothing else in memory. Not even a memory manager or EMS/XMS, none of that. Make sure the settings match what's in your DosBox config. I was able to run the game with sound using GUS support and music. In fact, the GUS is the best way to listen to any music from the game as it utilizes a combination of FM synthesis and digital samples.

How do I use to GUS to have the music and sound effects play in the game? I'm really new to Dosbox and I'd really like to finally play this game, which I now have the full version of. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Simply have the GUS enabled. I think the program should auto-detect your GUS settings. There is no Setup utility from what I understand. If you still don't get anything, make sure the GUS is enabled in your DosBox configuration file.

You may try to start the game by adding the '/u' parameter; ZONE66.EXE /u

As they said above, disable XMS and EMS. You can enable UMB if needed.

One thing I've found interesting is that the intro music sounds vastly different if you use a GUS than a SB16.

On a Soundblaster the intro music sounds hardcore rock/techno.

On a GUS the intro music sounds more new wave ambient.

I prefer the SB version of the intro music since it seems to fit better with the story.

I also found that setting core=normal and cycles=8000 or cycles=10000 seems to work really well for me with Zone 66.

In any case:

"zone66 /u" forces use of the Gravis Ultrasound

"zone66 /s" forces use of the Soundblaster device

"zone66 /a" forces use of the Adlib OPL sound device

adding /k to the above also forces use of the keyboard controls for playing.

Also, I don't think you'll fully get the GUS music unless you also get the $ZONE66G.ZIP file which contains additional music for the GUS and extract the files into the ZONE66 directory.

If you need it, I've attached my shareware copy of Zone66 with additional GUS music.

Hi I am new to dos box and I was wondering if someone could provide the line by line on what to type to get sound and sound effects to work in Zone 66 as I am a bit confused by the instructions above. I am running Windows XP Pro Service Pack 3 with Dos Box .72. The lines I used are as follows:

mount e e:\
e:
cd zone66
ems off
xms off
zone66.exe/s

Thanks!

We do not provide exact instructions here for specific games.

1. Install DOSBox.
2. Mount virtual C drive
3. Mount virtual D drive for CDROM if necessary
3. Install game WITHIN DosBox.
4. Configure Game
5. Adjust DOSBox.conf settings as necessary.
6. Play game.

I have gotten the sound and sound effects to work in game. Though I am unable to get the intro music to work. I got the sound effects and sound to work by adding GUS on.

mount e e:\
e:
cd zone66
ems off
xms off
GUS on <-- part added
zone66

Also I am curious on how to get the different types of intro music to work in the game. GUS vs SB16 (see WonderSlug post)

Well, you should first make sure that your copy of the game includes the GUS music (from what I recall it was a separate download for the shareware version, and on separate disks for the registered version). If it does, you'll probably need to run the game with something like this:

1zone66 /g

I can't remember off-hand if that's the right command line switch.

Is the intro music the only difference between the gravis and sound blaster versions?

Also does anyone know what files the gravis music thats in the attached shareware version are and if you do would it be possible to just drop those files into the zone66 directory?

Not to bump a 2 month old post, but people are still having trouble 2 years later getting the exact settings for this game. I was grateful to find this topic last night and finally got Zone 66 completely working with SoundBlaster audio, both music and sounds. I have to agree that the SB intro/main menu theme sounds much more fitting than the GUS intro.

Sax is right - this game is extremely picky when it comes to the SoundBlaster audio. You even need the right cpu core and cycles set for them to work, which doesn't really sound like it would make sense. I've reproduced the dosbox settings categories that I changed in the config file that finally allowed Zone 66 is work right. In a way, some of this is also a compilation of what other posters suggested to try, but all in one place for reference.

[cpu]

core=normal
cputype=auto
cycles=9000

You need these CPU options set like this even if you have the right sound configuration, or SB music won't work.

[mixer]

rate=49716
blocksize=2048
prebuffer=10

The high rate is just so the music will be less scratchy when you get it going.

[sblaster]

sbtype=sb16
sbbase=220
irq=5
dma=1
hdma=5
sbmixer=true
oplmode=auto
oplemu=default
oplrate=49716 ............ To match with the mixer rate above.

Zone 66 says that it can detect SoundBlaster support if your irq is set to 3, 5, or 7. Personally I've found that setting games to 5 instead of 7 can help if you're having quality problems.

xms=false
ems=false
umb=true
keyboardlayout=auto

Stated by Zone 66 - xms needs to be off. Turn ems off to fix the extended memory complaint you get when running Z66 with xms false but ems true.

You could set a batch file to set the settings temporarily just for playing Zone 66 instead of using the config file, or just load these settings as a custom config file. After these are set, just run ZONE66.EXE without any force-sound switches - you shouldn't need them.