how can you tell what OS is on a hard drive?

Question

I am trying to repair the operating system on an old computer " I believe the operating system is an Windows XP " I have managed to get to BIOS so there is No damage to the hardware of the tower.

I am using a SABRENT adapter to link the hard drive itself to a USB port on my laptop and saving data before major work begins. FROM THIS POINT... How can I tell which Operating system is the hard drive working with by looking at the data presented to me by tons of files.

I am wondering if I should use Amazon.com to Buy the OS disc of Either Windows XP home edition ,Windows NT, Windows Professional, or any windows OS between 98 and Vista?

"I know at least that there is iTunes programs on it so it couldn't be a 98 OS"

I don't know what to get until I know what was originally inside the old computer I'm trying to fix

Answer 1

Win2K/XP - Check Windows\System32 for the file prodspec.ini.

(Might be WinNT\System32 on Win2K)

Open in Notepad to see which version of Windows is installed. Scroll down, there may be a lot of blank lines at the top.



Vista/Win 7, check the Windows folder for .xml files. One will be the version installed, HomeBasic.xml, HomePremium.xml, Ultimate.xml, etc



Win2K and XP will have a Documents and Settings folder in the root of the drive.

Vista and later will have a Documents and Settings Junction point

Do a "DIR X:\ /A" in a command prompt, Junctions will be listed as

(X is the letter of the drive as it appears connected with the SABRENT adapter).

Vista and later will have a Users folder in the root of the drive.



Win2K and XP will both have a boot.ini file and ntldr in the root of the drive. You can read the boot.ini file in notepad, it should list what version it is, but that can be edited.

Vista and later will have bootmgr and a Boot folder, though these may be on a small 100 MB partition, usually labeled as System Reserved when viewed in Disk Management. If upgraded from XP, may still have boot.ini and ntldr.



You can also use Regedit and load the software hive located at Windows\System32\config (named software with no extension)

Load it under HKLM, name it @Software, then navigate to here:

HKLM\@Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion

Check the ProductName value. This won't specify the particular version for XP though, both Home and Pro just say Windows XP.

Vista and later should list the version. If not, look for a value named Edition ID

The Service Pack installed should be listed in the CSDVersion value

Answer 2

Another way you can tell is to look in

C:\Program Files\



Look for a folder called "Windows Sidebar", if you see it you are looking at

either a Vista or a Windows7 installation if you don't see that folder you are

seeing an XP or Earlier operating system



If you see a "program files" folder AND a "Program Files (x86)"

you are looking at a 64bit version.



AD

Answer 3

well one way to tell what operating system based on the data presented is by looking at the C:\ so if C:\ contain c:\Documents and Settings then its a Windows XP and if it doesn't, it probably have C:\User which is probably Windows 7 but it terms of, if its a Professional Version, Home version, etc.. hard to tell unless you turn on the operating system.