Know Your System Inside Out

good
key review info
application features
  • Comprehensive hardware information
  • (5 more, see all...)

What does it take to get to know your own computer down to the smallest detail? You can't possibly look for the detailed specs of a component or even remember all of them. And you definitely can't remember all the details available for each component of the system, not when there is specialized software specifically designed to give you precisely these details. The list of professional system information tools is not extremely large, and some of them only scratch the surface when retrieving the details, while others present so much information that it would make a newbie reboot in an instant.

If your standards call for more than just scratch info on the components of your system, there is plenty of software on the market that can accomplish this – and for free, too. HwiNFO (Hardware Info) has gained immense popularity especially since it turned freeware. However, this is not the only reason for its appeal to the users.

It comes with a super clear interface that leaves no room for confusion, even for the utmost noob out there. Of course, for the information it displays, you will need some background in the hardware field, otherwise the bigger part of it will seem like mumbo jumbo. All the hardware components roll down in a side panel in the left part of the application window, while the details appear on the right as soon as you select a computer part.

The list of components shown on the left makes sure to include, besides the important parts that inject performance to the system, like CPU, motherboard, video and RAM, the smaller ones as well, which generally fall in second place and that grease everything for the optimum functionality: BUS subsystem, drives, network components, ports, monitor, and audio card. For each element in the list, HWiNFO provides details about sub-components. This way, it covers all the data an advanced user requires in order to learn about the insides of the system.

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Before the application starts scanning your computer configuration, which takes just a few seconds, HWiNFO allows for a minimum configuration. It is nothing complicated for a user who knows what low-level PCI access, SMBus or GPU I2C support is. It also permits enabling the detection of TPM (Trusted Platform Modules), ACPI enumeration, or performing an audio codec check.

Additional options here include starting the debug mode so that, in case anything goes wrong, you can send a debug report to the developer and he'll pinpoint the issue and eliminate it. The best part of this configuration panel is that it shows details about every option the moment you hover your mouse over it. Moreover, the options that are likely to cause trouble on some machines are not enabled, and the developer duly informs the user of this in the tooltip.

As mentioned above, the clear view of all the components makes it easy to navigate from one section to another. If you think that HWiNFO will just read the data off your system and display it, you must think too little of the application. It can also detect and read CPU temperature sensors, display a system summary and benchmark your system's performance. In order to see how powerful your computer is, HWiNFO can list a comparison sheet that includes systems ranging from high-end to low-end. Yours will be highlighted.

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The application shows lots of fine details about your system, some of them quite complicated if you are not into hardware. RAM intel is one such case, which, besides the intelligible data about module size, type, speed, serial number, module and manufacturing date, also includes a list of capabilities. This, in turn, comprises characteristics (module width, voltage, SPD revision, number of ranks, row address bits, number of banks, column address bits) and module timing details (refresh rate, supported burst lengths, supported CAS latencies, minimum RAS-to-CAS delay, supported module timing, write recovery time, address and command setup time, etc.), which might look like gibberish to the uninitiated.

This information break-down pattern goes for almost any item available in the tree-view. If you're running the application on a laptop, it'll give you even precious details about the battery: serial number, the capacity for which it was originally designed and the full-charge capacity, wear level, power status (recorded when the application was first launched), current capacity (percentage of charge level included) and voltage.

Hard drives are skimmed of information like geometry (number of heads, number of sectors, total 32-bit and 48-bit LBA sectors, buffer size, controller type), transfer mode (sectors per interrupt, multiword/singleword DMA mode, Ultra DMA mode, transfer width), device flags, features supported and S.M.A.R.T. attributes present.

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Nevertheless, in the case of hard disks, some issues are present, which may be on account of the fact that the software is still in beta stage. In our case, on the three different systems we put the app against, it showed the same number of cylinders although the test computers were equipped with different hardware: two Western Digital (WDC WD1200JB-00REA0 and WDC WD800JD-75MSA3) and a Fujitsu (FUJITSU MHW2160BH PL). HWiNFO showed 16383 cylinders for all of them. More on the downside, it did not determine the number of bytes per sector and bytes per track for any of them. Also, removable drives are not detected, despite the fact that Device Flags has a line that tells you if the drive is portable or not. The bright side is that the other information present is accurate and comes in great amounts.

In the case of the monitor, the application failed to recognize one of three screens we used. Even if the third monitor was not recognized (a 17-inch widescreen Samsung of a Compaq laptop), the application read the exact details about it: screen size, manufacturing date, advanced parameters (input signal, display type, gamma factor) and DPMS modes. In the other two cases, however, although the program detected the brand, and everything else, it failed to pinpoint the maximum vertical and horizontal sizes, and presented the same values for both of them despite the fact that one was 17in and the other 19in. Everything else was in order, though.

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The summary window that can be set to be opened automatically with the launch of the app presents a CPU and GPU analysis, functioning parameters, chipset, the clock for each CPU clock (in case of multi-core systems), BIOS date, RAM amount and type, operating system, drives available, etc. To make a long story short, this is the abbreviated version of the entire informational section in the application. This data is intelligible for the average user, while an advanced one can quickly determine the power of the system in a single glance.

Benchmarking is another component included in HWiNFO, giving you insight on the performance of your computer compared to others. There is no complex setting here, but only a matter of ticking boxes with what you want to be evaluated: the choices you’re presented with are CPU, RAM, and hard disk. For an accurate check, you have to close all other programs and permit unhindered assessment for HWiNFO. It does not take long to show the results, and next to them you can find the buttons that open the comparison charts.

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As for the sensors HWiNFO can read, some users may be rather disappointed because the readings refer to CPU and its cores. Granted, this is useful, especially in the context of the rising temperatures around the world, but a good addition would have been monitoring the hard disk temperature as well.

UPDATE: Additional testing showed that the application can read more than the CPU temperature sensors and extends this detail to hard disks as well via reading the S.MA.R.T. attributes (if available). The picture below are proof of this.

Also, the recorded values can be placed in the system tray (all of them or just specific ones) so that you can check them out at a glance. For fast distinguishing between them the developer added a color code option which is customizable, as well as their names (check the tooltip of the tray icon).

HWiNFO is undoubtedly an extremely handy tool to have on your computer, with its portability making it even more appealing. It provides valued information about the system extremely quickly, and integrates hardware benchmarking and temperature reading. In our case, it showed some of its flaws, especially on the laptop we tested it on. But some of them were also present on the other two systems. Despite this, it makes for a great piece of software that needs to be developed continuously (and from what I've seen, the developer does a great job at it).

The Good

The tree-view on the left does a perfect job at easily browsing the components and learning the details about them. However, the core of the app lies in the set of particularities it can reveal about the scanned system.

It is fast in its analysis and the sheer amount of info is simply overwhelming for its size and quickness. The Summary window gives you a fast view of the most important components of the computer, while the Benchmark section lets you see how your PC scores compared to other systems.

You can create reports containing all the data presented in the main window. The file can be saved as TXT, comma delimited file, XML, HTML, MHTML or as a simple short text report.

The Bad

We had our share of trouble testing it, as the amount of data it presents is simply unbelievable. However, it showed that there was some trouble with monitors and hard disk readings. Also, when the developer said that some configuration options were not recommended for just any system and enabling them was not prudent, he was definitely not kidding.

The beta stage of HwiNFO32 bared its teeth and BSOD'ed our test laptop just by simply enabling ACPI enumeration.

The Truth

With all the weak points, HwiNFO32 deserves a spot on your removable storage device. It provides valuable details on the system, even if in some cases it cannot quite recognize all the parameters, features and capabilities of the computer parts.

For a brief analysis, you have the Summary window, while benchmarking places the system in a chart, together with computers with various degrees of performance.

Given it is a beta, we cannot award it more than 3 stars, which is the default for every rated section, but if it were a stable version, it would undoubtedly deserve 4 stars.

Click here for our full report on a final build of the application, which received the maximum of 5 stars.

user interface 3
features 3
ease of use 3
pricing / value 3


final rating 3
Editor's review
good
 
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Photo Gallery (3 Images)

HWiNFO CPU screen
Some of the sensors detected by HWiNFOConfiguration panel for sensor monitoring