Is it possible to find out the version/edition of a Windows 7 installation by looking at files on the hard disk?

Question

Is it possible to find out what version of Windows 7 I have installed (for example Home Premium 64-bit) by looking at the files on the disk?

The disk I have is a MBR installed Windows 7 copied to a GPT formatted disk, and the bootloader is kind of out of order, so I can't verify.

Also, for whatever reason I have not been able to open the registry on the disk, so a method that does not need it is preferred.

Is the version string stored in any file?

Answer 1

Look in the %SystemRoot%. There should be an .xml file with the name of the installed edition (eg. HomePremium.xml). For the architecture, the easiest is to check for the presence of the SysWOW64 folder.

Answer 2

To find the installed edition and licence type (retail/OEM), you can check the licence agreement, which is found at X:\Windows\System32\license.rtf (replace "X:" with the drive letter assigned to the Windows partition).

To find the architecture (64-bit vs. 32-bit), there are some files and folders you can check for the presence of:

• X:\Program Files (x86)

• X:\Windows\SysWOW64

• anything with "64" in the file name in X:\Windows\inf (that's where Windows keeps driver setup files, and a 32-bit system is not going to have 64-bit drivers)

Those files/folders only exist on a 64-bit Windows installation.