Finding Driver Information using PowerShell

 

PowerTip of the Day, from PowerShell.com:

driverquery.exe returns all kinds of information about installed drivers, but the information seems a bit useless at first:

PS> driverquery.exe /V

 

Module Name     Display Name                  Description                   Driver Type         Start Mode State          St

============ ================  ================== ============= ========== =======  ==

1394ohci           OHCI-konformer 1394-Ho OHCI-konformer 1394-Ho Kernel    Manual         Stopped     OK
20.11.2010 11:44:56    C:\Windows\system32\drivers\1394ohci.sys         4.096

This console application does support a parameter called /FO CSV. This formats the information as a comma-separated list:

PS> driverquery.exe /v /FO CSV

"Module Name","Display Name","Description","Driver Type","Start Mode","State","S

tatus","Accept Stop","Accept Pause","Paged Pool(bytes)","Code(bytes)","BSS(bytes

)","Link Date","Path","Init(bytes)"

"1394ohci","OHCI-konformer 1394-Hostcontroller","OHCI-konformer 1394-Hostcontrol

ler","Kernel ","Manual","Stopped","OK","FALSE","FALSE","4.096","200.704","0","20

.11.2010 11:44:56","C:\Windows\system32\drivers\1394ohci.sys","4.096"

Now here's the scoop: Powershell can not only read the results from console application. When the output is CSV, it can even convert the raw text automagically into objects. So, with just one line, you get tremendous information about drivers (thanks to Stephen Owen for pointing us to this):

PS> driverquery.exe /v /FO CSV | ConvertFrom-CSV | Select-Object 'Display Name',

 'Start Mode', 'Paged Pool(bytes)', Path

 

Display Name                     Start Mode               Paged Pool(bytes)       Path

------------                     ----------                -----------------      ----

OHCI-konformer 1... Manual                         4.096                                       C:\Windows\syste...

Microsoft ACPI-T... Boot                              90.112                                     C:\Windows\syste...

ACPI-Energieanze... Manual                         4.096                                       C:\Windows\syste...

(...)

 

Thanks