How To Find Your Computer BIOS Version In Windows
Recently my computer has started to give me problems with displaying incorrect battery usage on my computer. My computer is a year old (running Vista) and I have not made any changes except for the typical hotfixes and patches that are installed from Windows update (which I suspect caused the problem). I searched around the Internet and it sounds like I may need to update my BIOS.
How can I find the BIOS version in Windows without rebooting to check it?
There are many ways to check the BIOS version of your Computer in Windows, but the easiest way is to just use System Information which shows general information about your Computer and the Operating System.
To view the System Information screen, click on Start \ Run… and in the run box type msinfo32 and press OK.
Once the System Information window opens, make sure System Summary is highlighted in the left navigation window, and look for BIOS Version/Date in the right summary window.
You can also check the BIOS version from the command prompt. Just click on Start \ Run… and in the run box type systeminfo and press OK.
Or to just display the BIOS information only, enter the following command at the prompt:
systeminfo | find "BIOS Version:"
(Note: the | pipe symbol can be found using SHIFT+\ (just above the Enter key).
While you are at it, make sure you also install Vista SP1 since it does include a lot of fixes and improvements. Unless of course your problems started after SP1 was installed, then making sure your BIOS version is current will probably eliminate a lot of those little problems you are having.
Filed under Computer How-To by Watching The Net
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