WAV

The Waveform Audio File Format (or WAV file) was developed by IBM and Microsoft to store digitized audio on PC-compatible computers.

History
The format was jointly defined in August 1991 by IBM and Microsoft as part of their Multimedia Programming Interface and Data Specifications for use in and Microsoft Windows, respectively. Many other operating systems support playback of .wav files and conversion tools are widely available.

The .wav file format is also supported by some MIDI sequencers as add-on audio. That is, pre-recorded .wav files are played back by control commands written in the sequence script.