SearchThe WMI Meter - Our Misunderstood Friend?A lot of people don't know about the WMI meter (or have heard of it but don't know what is/what it stands for/what it can do).WMI stands for Windows Management Instrumentation. Simply put, the WMI meter can display almost ANY information about your computer (or network computer if you have the correct access rights). Unlike the Perfmon meter, it is not limited to numerical data such as bytes sent/received or CPU % load - it can display your IP address, video card driver version, operating system name and version... the list is huge! In fact there are so many that the list may almost be daunting. To use a WMI meter in Samurize, add a WMI meter using the Add Meter button like you would for any other meter, and select "Add WMI". Then click on the "Change Settings" button under the Source tab. You will be presented with the WMI Meter Properties window. Here you specify the computer you wish to obtain information from, and the exact information you want to obtain. Computer - the name of the computer you want to get information from (use . for your local computer) Username - the login username for the computer (can be left blank for the local computer) Password - the login password for the computer (can be left blank for the local computer) Connect - click this button once you have filled in the above three fields to connect to the WMI service on the specified computer. Once you have connected to the machine, you can select a WMI class from the WMI Class dropdown box. Some of the class names are not very descriptive so it can sometimes be hard to know what to look for. An example class is Win32_NetworkAdapter, which represents network adapter devices attached to your computer. Once you have selected a class, you then select an instance from the Instances box. For many classes, your computer is likely to have several instances. For example, the Win32_NetworkAdapter class has an instance for each network adapter device attached to your computer. Select the one you want to monitor. Finally, select the property you desire from the Properties box. The property names are usually descriptive enough to work out what they mean. For example, selecting the MACAddress property of the Win32_NetworkAdapter class will display the MAC address of the selected network adapter. Selecting the Manufacturer property will display the name of the manufacturer of the selected network adapter. Once you have finished, click on the OK button. One thing to note about the WMI meters is that although they are capable of displaying some information that perfmons can (eg. %CPU load), the WMI meters are quite a bit slower and use more CPU cycles to retreive the information. It is best to use perfmons whereever possible for numerical data. If you don't know where to start looking for the property you want in the huge list of WMI classes, here is a list of some of the more useful/common ones and what they represent: Win32_Battery - batteries (common on laptops) Win32_Bios - BIOS information Win32_CDROMDrive - CDROM drives Win32_CodecFile - installed codecs Win32_DesktopMonitor - monitor(s) attached to the computer Win32_Diskdrive - hard drives on local machine Win32_DiscPartition - drive partitions on local machine Win32_Keyboard - keyboard(s) attached to the computer Win32_LogicalDisk - all drives (including network-mapped) on the computer Win32_NetworkAdapter - network adapter devices Win32_NetworkAdapterConfiguration - more info for network adapter devices (eg. IP address) Win32_OperatingSystem - information about the operating system Win32_PageFile - system pagefiles Win32_PointingDevice - pointing devices (ie. mice) Win32_Processor - logical processors (ie. HT-enabled P4s wills have 2) Win32_Service - state etc. of Services Win32_Share - shared directories Win32_SoundDevice - sound device information Win32_VideoController - video device information eg. driver version Finally, it takes a very long time to enumerate all the WMI classes, so the class list in Samurize is actually static (there may be classes in there that do not exist on your computer, or classes that are on your computer but missing from the list). The latest Samurize releases have a field in the WMI Meter Properties window where you can enter the name of a WMI class that does not appear in the list. If you want to see a complete list of all the WMI classes on your computer, the MS WMI Scriptomatic is a handy tool to have. For advanced users, you can also use Start->Run->wbemtest but be careful not to change anything that you shouldn't; it is a very powerful tool. | ||
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