Wave file

 

A Wave file is an audio file format, created by Microsoft, that has become a standard PC audio file format for everything from system and game sounds to CD-quality audio. A Wave file is identified by a file name extension of WAV (.wav). Used primarily in PCs, the Wave file format has been accepted as a viable interchange medium for other computer platforms, such as Macintosh. This allows content developers to freely move audio files between platforms for processing, for example.

In addition to the uncompressed raw audio data, the Wave file format stores information about the file’s number of tracks (mono or stereo), sample rate, and bit depth.

Selected Links

Joe's Original Wave Files offers an assortment of public-domain short Wave files you can download. For example, here is a trumpet fanfare.

Synth Zone provides a directory of Audio Sampling and Sample Sites for Wave files as well as MP3 and other sound file formats.


Created on March 21, 1999.

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