Determine Windows Version, Edition and Service Pack OF AN OFFLINE DISK IMAGE

Question

Using the registry alone, how does one detect: The Windows Version (XP, Vista, 7). The Edition (Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate). And The Service Pack level (Beta, RTM, SP1, SP2).

This is because I am repairing on offline system. The Registry of offline systems can be mounted and accessed.

Solution 1

Use the values under HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion. I presume you know where to find that hive?! The respective hive can be found under %SystemRoot%\System32\config with the name SOFTWARE.

Side-note: you can attempt to verify your results by looking at some well-known files (e.g. kernel32.dll, ntdll.dll) and into their version information resource (what you're looking for is the file version: with, e.g. GetFileVersionInfo()).

Edition values, if that's needed, can be found at HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\ProductOptions. See here.

Solution 2

Everything you want is in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion.

However, I believe these values can be faked, so be cautious.

Comments

[user541686]

EditionID, CSDVersion, BuildLab, Product Name, etc... there's a lot of redundancy there, and I think none of them is foolproof. Probably the most descriptive is BuildLab; for me it's: 7601.win7sp1_rtm.101119-1850. You'll still need EditionID though (HomePremium, etc.).

[unixman83]

is there a better way then? like querying the file version of some what system file?

[0xC0000022L]

the latter can be found at HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\ProductOptions

[user541686]

@unixman83: Querying files (@STATUS's solution) will work for most things, but not for the edition (Home Premium vs Ultimate).

[0xC0000022L]

@unixman83: any well-known file will work. Make sure to verify it's a signed (and valid) version of the file. Which should be possible ever since XP. On 2000 I think not all were signed.

[Nux]

To load a hive you use regedit. You can do this from any Windows machine and should not affect your installation. Just load the hive and choose some temporary name for a new branch. More here: zeda.nl/index.php/en/load-user-registry-hive-in-regedit