Is it possible to differentiate WinPE and other Windows?

Hello,

Is it possible to differentiate WinPE and other Windows?

Background: I run my program on WinPE and it shows it is running on Windows
Vista. It is not what I wanted and I want to differentiate WinPE and other
Windows.

Thanks!

Bo Xie wrote:
> Is it possible to differentiate WinPE and other Windows?
>
> Background: I run my program on WinPE and it shows it is running on
> Windows Vista. It is not what I wanted and I want to differentiate
> WinPE and other Windows.

Windows PE is Windows XP or Windows Vista (or Windows 2003 or Windows
2008)...

It's just loading necessary components into memory so you can use it.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

"Bo Xie" <xiebopublic@sina.com> wrote in message
news:uXK50ya4IHA.3784@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...

> Is it possible to differentiate WinPE and other Windows?
>
> Background: I run my program on WinPE and it shows it is running on
Windows
> Vista. It is not what I wanted and I want to differentiate WinPE and other
> Windows.

1. You seem to mean WindowsXP (not PE) and Vista. (As
Operating Systems, there is no difference between the Pro
and Home editions of WinXP. The Pro edition offers more
functions for networking etc.

2. OSs are peculiar to installed systems, not to software
(although it is known that apps that run under some OSs
will not run under other OSs.)
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

> Windows PE is Windows XP or Windows Vista (or Windows 2003 or Windows
> 2008)...
>
> It's just loading necessary components into memory so you can use it.

I understand it. But I want to differentiate WinPE and other Windows. I
think there are differencese and that's why we call it "WinPE", not "WinXP"
or "Vista". e.g., I heard that WinPE has not "event log" service and
XP/Vista have it.

I want this kind of trick to differentiate WinPE and other Windows. e.g.,
there might be a register in register table that shows it is a WinPE, not
XP/Vista.

"Bo Xie" <xiebopublic@sina.com> wrote:

>> Windows PE is Windows XP or Windows Vista (or Windows 2003 or Windows
>> 2008)...
>>
>> It's just loading necessary components into memory so you can use it.
>
>I understand it. But I want to differentiate WinPE and other Windows. I
>think there are differencese and that's why we call it "WinPE", not "WinXP"
>or "Vista". e.g., I heard that WinPE has not "event log" service and
>XP/Vista have it.
>
>I want this kind of trick to differentiate WinPE and other Windows. e.g.,
>there might be a register in register table that shows it is a WinPE, not
>XP/Vista.
>

You might want to look at HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion

And see if a couple of these sub-keys are always consistent in a WinPE
environment. For example InstallDate would likely be missing or zero.
I see other keys there that you may also be able to test...

Same thing likely goes for
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion


Or, you could continue with your idea of testing for existence of a
particular service like eventlog and base your decision on that...

HTH