View In Depth Hardware Specs Using PowerShell

At some point In time, you will have the need to check the hardware specifications on your computer, particularly when replacing or upgrading a hardware component, or checking whether It can run a game that you're looking to purchase. The same applies when troubleshooting a problematic Internal device. As such, In this tutorial, I will show you how to obtain detailed specs of all major hardware components.


There are many third-party tools that can also grab your PC's specs, but why download a given tool when It can be done natively (and probably more effectively) within Windows Itself? Moreover, the majority of software do not segregate the specifications, but rather display the lot In a cluttered and somewhat disorganized manner.

After all, you don't plan on upgrading or replacing every hardware component In one hit, do you? For this reason alone, I will be demonstrating how to view your hardware specs separately, by using a very powerful built-In utility named PowerShell. So without further delay, let's get this tutorial started.

Accessing PowerShell: 

The first thing you need to do, Is access PowerShell with elevated privileges. Open the Search bar, enter powershell and on the search result at the top, right-click It and select Run as administrator. You're now ready to checkout your hardware specs.

Viewing The BIOS Specs:

For whatever reason It may be, If you're planning to flash the BIOS, use the following command to see the manufacturer, version and serial number.

Get-WmiObject win32_bios

Physical Memory Specs:

Provided the motherboard accommodates It, It's very common to boost performance by adding an extra Ram stick. The following command provides In depth Information about your Installed Memory.

Get-WmiObject CIM_PhysicalMemory

Here's a couple of examples.

Partition Information:

If you have multiple partitions or drives, use this command to view the drive letter, used & free space, and also the Provider and Root (Directory).

gdr -PSProvider 'FileSystem'

CPU Specifications:

This command provides some basic Information about your CPU (Processor). Nonetheless, It's all you need when looking to replace or upgrade It.

Get-WmiObject –class Win32_processor | ft systemname,Name,DeviceID,NumberOfCores,NumberOfLogicalProcessors, Addresswidth

Hard Disk Information:

Hard disks tend to fail at the best of times. Use the following command to get the serial numbers and health status of your drives.

Get-Disk

Graphics Card Details:

I couldn't find a way to view the GPU details via PowerShell, hence I've used the Command Prompt as per below.

wmic path win32_VideoController get name 

Operating System Info:

Although this Is not relative to hardware specifications, for compatibility reasons, It's still beneficial to know your OS version & build number. The following command returns such results.

[environment]::OSVersion.Version

Network Adapter Specs:

Whether you're running Wireless, Ethernet, Bluetooth, Virtual network adapters or otherwise, this command grabs the lot.

Get-NetAdapter

Virtual Machine Status:

If you're like myself, whereby you have Virtual Machines Installed on your Host (physical) machine, this gets their current status. In my case, I have one VM up and running named Windows 10 Tips.

Get-VM

Printer Information:

Be It at home or at work, this command retrieves the Name, Type (local or network) and Driver Name of all Installed printers.

Get-Printer

Final Thoughts:

The good thing about this entire tutorial, Is that you can pick and choose what hardware device you wish to view It's specifications. There are a few native utilities In Windows that display your specs, but not all are dedicated to a device of your choice, nor do they provide In depth Information as per commands executed In PowerShell. And that's what makes this so effective.