The most important changes are binary output mode and the move to POSIX-style options/arguments that'll make it more versatile and easier to use. Also included is a DASM-style output that appends a \t to each .byte directive.

Grab it now!
https://github.com/JeffAlyanak/pcm2pwm/tree/v1.0

Though I'm using an audio track ripped from a CD, it's basically a sound bite from Pulp Fiction which you can see the exact ~14-second clip on this YouTube video starting at 1:49, https://youtu.be/PvMxbRCBalk?t=109

I took the audio into Adobe Audition and compressed it so all the peaks are nearly clipped. I then saved the file as a mono 96kHz 8bit WAV. I ran it through your tool and I got a file with 768 8-bit values. I haven't written the code yet to play back the file, so before I try to make it work I wanted to ask if this sounded correct. I was expecting many times that number. I tried it again but using Audacity, and saved it as a mono 44.1kHz 8-bit unsigned WAV. Your tool produced a file now with only 681 bytes.

Grab it now and see for yourself how much better the results are!

https://github.com/JeffAlyanak/pcm2pwm/tree/v0.8.1

Well, that's the only new feature in pcm2pwm v0.8! Enjoy!

https://github.com/JeffAlyanak/pcm2pwm/tree/v0.8

Here is the file: http://dl.free.fr/nYTPVW2el

I've compiled the latest code from github and I'm using linux (mint)

I'm trying this, but it acts rather strangely:

./pcm2pwm piano8bit.wav

all I get is:
.byte $00,$FF,$FF

My file should be legit I guess:
piano8bit.wav: RIFF (little-endian) data, WAVE audio, Microsoft PCM, 8 bit, mono 44100 Hz

it's 45 kb big

(I exported as 8bit unsigned in audacity)

Is it only that file that is having trouble? What version of the tool are you running and on what OS? If it's just the one file can you email me the file in question?

./pcm2pwm piano8bit.wav

all I get is:
.byte $00,$FF,$FF

My file should be legit I guess:
piano8bit.wav: RIFF (little-endian) data, WAVE audio, Microsoft PCM, 8 bit, mono 44100 Hz

it's 45 kb big

(I exported as 8bit unsigned in audacity)

https://github.com/JeffAlyanak/pcm2pwm

Just made a few small changes to the pcm2pwm tool and I've also thrown the source up for anyone who wants to muck about with it. The only really visible change is the ability to set your own high and low crossover values, making it unnecessary to amplify your input wav file to near clipping. That said, you'll still want to sound to be relatively heavily compressed and setting these crossovers might be a hit or miss process in terms of getting a decent representation of the original sound's timbre.

simple ZX Spectrum replayer: http://irrlichtproject.de/downloads/pwm2zx.tar.gz
feel free to add it to your package. btw what does the long word at the beginning of the sample data mean?

That had to do with jitter compensation in the demo that this was to be used in. It's pretty much useless for anyone else although it won't really do any harm if "played back" unless timing is very, very critical (it'll just be a delay of 255 x routine speed).

#!/usr/bin/perl

use warnings; use strict;

my $instr = "";
$instr = $instr . $_ while (<>);

my $state = 0;
foreach my $byte ($instr =~ /\$(..)/g) {
    for (my $i = 0; $i < hex("0x" . $byte); $i++) {
        print pack("C", $state * 255);
    }
    $state = 1 - $state;
}

(i just wanted to see what the results would sound like & im lazy)