If you have the file but the sound is still distorted or missing:

In the context of arcade emulation, refers to a custom audio system developed by Capcom for their CP System II (CPS-2) and CP System III (CPS-3) arcade hardware. It enabled high-quality digital audio, including sampled voices, music, and sound effects.

Example command line:

To the average user, it looks like just another file. But to audio enthusiasts and emulation historians, that little archive represents a massive victory in the war for perfect sound. It is the story of how a proprietary, forgotten chip was finally defeated by software, and why that "patched" version is the gold standard for retro gaming today.

In early arcade emulators like MAME, QSound was handled via Low-Level Emulation (LLE). LLE attempts to replicate the exact physical circuitry and microcode of the original QSound DSP chip (the custom Kabuki or DL-1425 chips). LLE is incredibly resource-intensive.