Tuesday, January 25, 2011

BGinfo - One COOL Desktop background from Sysinternals!

Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich talks about ...
Image by Microsoft PDC via Flickr


Imagine this scenario.  You have called tech support and the technician is asking you what version of Windows is on your desktop computer.  While troubleshooting, the technician asks how much memory is installed and how much hard drive space is available. 
Imagine this scenario.  The IT department is installing new wireless network cards in all employee laptops.  You are a technician and you have been assigned the task of verifying the laptops that need new network adapters. 
In either case, precious minutes are wasted scrolling though several diagnostic screens in control panel to get to the information, or you waste time asking the user questions they probably have no answer for.
BGinfo is a really cool, free, Sysinternals utility written by Bryce Cogswell. BGinfo queries the Windows system and displays information on your desktop, such as ip address, computer name, memory, volumes and free space, Mac address, etc.  BGinfo writes a bitmap on your desktop and exits.  No system resources are consumed and it does not interfere with other programs.  You can put it in your start up folder so it displays current data every time you boot.   BGinfo is customizable and even lets you select the background color and wallpaper. Voila! You have the system info right at your fingertips. 
Mark Russinovich, of Sysinternals, has written an article about BGinfo in windowsitpro magazine.  Go check Windows Sysinternals out, and while you are at it, check out some of the other free utilities these gods have written and check out some of Mark's Webcasts.  See my page autoruns-another-awesome-freee-utility.html referencing another one of my very FAVorite system utilities written by Mark Russinovich.
Tutorial of BGinfo from Sysadmingeek
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3 comments:

  1. I made a couple of resolutions for myself at the start of this year. One of which was to collect the information from different sources. Your blog is more informative and helpful grow my knowledge about the product and it's use.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is good stuff. Is it ok if I pick some content up from here for my blog? Do you have any reservations? Or terms?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No prob. If you would mention my website, that would be appreciated.

      Delete

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