DOSBox-X Version 2026.03.29

DOSBox-X v2026.03.29 has been released. DOSBox-x is a variant of DOSBox. DOSBox emulates an Intel x86 PC, including sound, graphics, mouse, joystick, modem, and other components essential for running many classic MS-DOS games that cannot be executed on contemporary PCs and operating systems, such as Microsoft Windows XP, Windows Vista, Linux, and FreeBSD.

DOSBox-X Changelog:
Added a dosbox.conf option to regulate the duration of the beep when
DOS CON and INT 10h receive the BEL character. (joncampbell123).
Adjusted DOS CON device BEL handling: In IBM PC modes, utilize
INT 10h for the beep instead of duplicating code. Resolved the
DOS CON device so it beeps properly in PC-98 mode.
(joncampbell123).
Fixed a bug where the “zero memory on DOS allocation” option was
perpetually enabled. Certain games, such as “Bad Cat” depend on memory contents
persisting through DOS EXEC and memory allocation. (joncampbell123).
Corrected Hercules palette selection related to herc blend. (joncampbell123).
DOS kernel: The loader can now detect EXE files compressed with
EXEPACK when executing an EXE file. Depending on the new
exepack dosbox.conf setting, the loader can decompress the EXE,
disable the A20 gate, or refrain from any action. This adjustment aims to prevent
EXEPACK “Packed File is Corrupt” errors caused by enabling the A20 gate when
loading the EXE too low in memory. (joncampbell123).
Linux SDL1: Utilizes the XDG_SESSION_TYPE environment variable to determine
if DOSBox-X is running under X11 or Wayland. If so, fbcon and svga drivers are
prevented from initializing. There seems to be an issue where, if run under Wayland
without the XWayland compatibility layer, SDL1 defaults to the fbcon
driver, overtaking the screen via vtcon switching and the classic
fbdev driver interface. Avoid this occurrence! (joncampbell123).
INT 21h AH=4Ah memory resize: If memory resizing fails due to insufficient
space for the requested memory amount, it will not assign ownership
of the block to the program. This fixes a memory allocation error in California Games II; at
one point, the game requests an excessively large memory size during resize, which fails
but does not hinder the game. Previously, the memory block available was assigned
ownership to the game anyway. Later, after helicopter takeoff, the game attempts further memory
allocation, which fails due to the inaccurate ownership assignment to free memory. (joncampbell123).
Incorporated debug logging to indicate not only DOS kernel memory allocation,
deallocation, and resizing but also to log failure of memory operations.
Perhaps one day the root cause of the California Games II memory management issues will become clear. (joncampbell123).
Development now occurs across two main branches: master for complete emulation, and main-osfree for
versions of DOSBox-X where built-in MS-DOS OS emulation is disabled. The osfree
branch can solely boot a guest OS. Main-osfree is for jurisdictions that enforce OS-level
age verification laws and may view MS-DOS emulation as subject to such regulations. (joncampbell123).
El Torito CD-ROM floppy disk boot emulation is significantly faster than traditional floppy drives.
Bootable CDs will now load much quicker. (joncampbell123).
In the DOSBox-X shell: If a DOS error arises during program execution, the error code will be read and an
appropriate message printed on the console. Currently, only “Access Denied” has a specific error
message. (joncampbell123).
Skip loading of all keyboard code page and layout if running in PC-98
mode. PC-98 systems house the entire font in ROM with limited room for custom fonts, rendering
code page loading unnecessary in PC-98 mode. (joncampbell123).
Keyboard code page layout: Resolved a bug causing DOSBox-X to segfault due to an out-of-range
start_pos. Added range checks and error messages for better clarity. (joncampbell123).
Keyboard code page layout: The UPX unpacker checks the stack pointer (as a COM program would) to ascertain if enough
memory exists for decompression. If insufficient, it executes INT 20h to exit to DOS. However, the initial code page
execution fails to establish a proper PSP segment, so during execution, INT 20h is intercepted and
redirected safely to exit correctly. An error flag is set to indicate this occurrence. (joncampbell123).
Keyboard code page layout: When executing the CPI/CPX file due to detected UPX decompression, memory allocation is based on the file size plus appropriate stack space instead of assuming around 128KB of RAM after a smaller DOS allocation, which leads to startup crashes for lower memory sizes. (joncampbell123).
Debug printing now logs which code page file is loaded at startup (joncampbell123).
CPU Idle callback processing is now strictly limited to IRQ handling and one CPU instruction, rather than allowing multiple CPU instructions until the next scheduled emulator event. This resolves a bug where system calls utilizing the Idle callback (e.g., INT 21h) sometimes varied delay times due to emulator events, causing issues particularly with “scanline render on demand”, making some DOS games like Xargon take significantly longer for transitions. (joncampbell123).
The debugger LOGL command now includes the PIC_FullIndex() emulator time in milliseconds to aid in time and CPU state determination during debugging (joncampbell123).
Added dosbox.conf option for controlling whether VBE emulation provides the protected mode interface (joncampbell123).
Introduced dosbox.conf options vbememsize and vbememsizekb to dictate the amount of video memory reported through the VESA BIOS, which can be less than actual video memory (but must remain above 256KB). This option addresses issues with some DOS programs experiencing problems due to “excess” video memory in the system (joncampbell123).
Added INT 10h mode flag _REQUIRE_LFB. When enabled, INT 10h calls for setting VESA BIOS modes will fail unless the linear framebuffer version is requested. (joncampbell123).
S3 emulation will identify any requests exceeding bank switching limits in S3 hardware as _REQUIRE_LFB (joncampbell123).
The default Adlib emulation rate has been corrected from 48KHz to the actual hardware rate of 49716 (joncampbell123).
Fixed the crash encountered when starting the debugger on MinGW builds (maron2000).
Adjusted the ChinaSea/Big5-2003 extended code point ranges for CP951 to 0x9140–0xA3FE and 0xC6A1–0xFEFE (1abcd).
Replaced deprecated symbols to ensure compatibility with older macOS versions (maron2000).
Converted all bash-dependent shell scripts to be compliant with POSIX shell standards (pandasoli).
Eliminated 7 duplicate Chinese character mappings from CP951 (Big5-UAO) (1abcd).
Added SoundBlaster microphone input support (Windows WASAPI) (meldro364-glitch).
Resolved segfault issues during the launch of macOS builds (maron2000).
Extended OS/2 support for tinyfiledialogs, browser, and external programs alongside several other fixes. (josch1710).
Fixed the “Memory size mismatch” error while loading savestates in the MSVC build (rebb).
Resolved a crash related to dynamically allocated TempLine in the VGA system when loading savestates (rebb).
Integrated experimental Direct3D11 and Metal support (SDL2 only) (maron2000).
When exiting fullscreen, window rebuilding will only be enforced for OpenGL mode.
(rebb).
Ensured modifier keys are cleared prior to saving a savestate. (rebb).
Re-enabled WinMM joystick support for Windows SDL1 (maron2000).
Fixed the colors option failing to launch in TTF mode (maron2000).
Added an optional switch to disable post-exit delays in DX-CAPTURE (villesundell).
Delivered fixes for Emscripten builds for DOSBox X v2026.01.02 (grootpot).
Resolved prolonged freezes during startup on Linux (SmileTheory).
Corrected the window position option during launch (maron2000).
Fixed detection issues with EXEPACK failures (maron2000).
Integrated OS/2 dimension handling to UpdateWindowDimensions (josch1710).
Addressed volume label search handling issues (Allofich).
Microphone input: Made the Hands-Free profile (HFP) optional (maron2000).
macOS: Corrected a build script typo that caused the freetype library to fail to load.
(maron2000).
Fixed FPU FILD emulation (asemarafa).
Removed a range check in INT10_GetCursorPos that resulted in text glitches (maron2000).
Introduced experimental VS2026 CI builds, available as 64-bit Visual
Studio nightly builds. (maron2000).
macOS: Fixed garbled messages when opening image files from the dropdown menu.
(maron2000).
Corrected XCOPY argument parsing to appropriately handle switches directly
appended to file paths without whitespace. (maron2000).
Resolved instances of Yes/No characters remaining hardcoded as Y/N for languages specifying different characters (e.g., German). (maron2000)

Download: DOSBox-X v2026.03.29 x64
Source: Here