Microsoft Diagnostics (MSD) was a software tool developed by
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
to assist in the diagnostics of 1990s-era computers. Users primarily deployed this tool to provide detailed technical information about the user's software and hardware and to print the gathered information, usually for use by support technicians in troubleshooting and resolving problems.
The assumptions made by the program were valid until the late 1990s: it does not handle
plug-and-play
In computing, a plug and play (PnP) device or computer bus is one with a specification that facilitates the recognition of a hardware component in a system without the need for physical device configuration or user intervention in resolving reso ...
USB
Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...
or other new technologies that appeared around 2000.
In
PC DOS
PC or pc may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Player character or playable character, a fictional character controlled by a human player, usually in role-playing games or computer games
* '' Port Charles'', an American daytime TV soap opera
* ...
6.1 and above,
QCONFIG.EXE provides similar functionality.
Commercial alternatives include Manifest
MFT.EXE from Quarterdeck's
QEMM
Quarterdeck Expanded Memory Manager (QEMM) is a memory manager produced by Quarterdeck Office Systems in the late 1980s through the late 1990s. It was the most popular third-party memory manager for the MS-DOS and other DOS operating systems.
...
.
History
MSD.EXE first shipped with
Microsoft Word for Windows, and was later included in
Windows 3 Windows 3.x means either of, or all of the following versions of Microsoft Windows:
* Windows 3.0
* Windows 3.1x
Windows 3.1 is a major release of Microsoft Windows. It was released to manufacturing on April 6, 1992, as a successor to Windo ...
,
MS-DOS 6
MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...
,
and on the
Windows 9x
Windows 9x is a generic term referring to a series of Microsoft Windows computer operating systems produced from 1995 to 2000, which were based on the Windows 95 kernel and its underlying foundation of MS-DOS, both of which were updated in su ...
CD-ROMs. Because
OS/2
OS/2 (Operating System/2) is a series of computer operating systems, initially created by Microsoft and IBM under the leadership of IBM software designer Ed Iacobucci. As a result of a feud between the two companies over how to position OS/2 r ...
and
Windows NT
Windows NT is a proprietary graphical operating system produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released on July 27, 1993. It is a processor-independent, multiprocessing and multi-user operating system.
The first version of Win ...
contain code forked from DOS at the DOS 5 level, the versions of
MSD.EXE included here correspond to that of that era (i.e. version 2.0).
Windows NT 3 Windows NT 3.x may refer to either of, or all of the following versions of Microsoft Windows:
* Windows NT 3.1
* Windows NT 3.5
* Windows NT 3.51
Windows NT 3.51 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft and ...
and
NT 4
Windows NT 4.0 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft and oriented towards businesses. It is the direct successor to Windows NT 3.51, which was released to manufacturing on July 31, 1996, and then to retail ...
have
WINMSD, a program with similar features.
However, the DOS/Windows specific functions were replaced by similar Windows NT concerns.
WINMSDP.EXE, included in the resource kits, provides the print functionality of
MSD.EXE for
WINMSD. Since NT 5 (
Windows 2000
Windows 2000 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft and oriented towards businesses. It was the direct successor to Windows NT 4.0, and was released to manufacturing on December 15, 1999, and was officiall ...
),
WINMSD.EXE has been a loader for
MSINFO32.EXE
System Information (msinfo32.exe) is a system profiler included with Microsoft Windows that displays diagnostic and troubleshooting information related to the operating system, hardware and software. It has been bundled with Windows since Windows ...
.
Usage
Users generally started the program from the DOS Command Prompt using the command
MSD.EXE.
Starting the program under a DOS window in either Windows or OS/2 shows only the DOS details allocated for that DOS session, not for the machine in general.
Scope
Aspects of the system for which
MSD.EXE provided technical information:
# computer brand and processor information
# memory (total, EMS, and XMS)
# video (type such as VGA and manufacturer)
# network
# operating-system versions
# type of mouse (if installed)
# disk drives (and partitions), excluding CD-ROM drives etc.
# LPT ports
# COM ports
# IRQ status
#
TSR programs
# device drivers
# other adapters
Successor software
Microsoft replaced
MSD.EXE with
MSINFO32.EXE.
This has similar features, but targets more recent machines. It first appeared in
MS-Word, and later was distributed with
Plus! for Windows 95 and
Windows 98
Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. The second operating system in the 9x line, it is the successor to Windows 95, and was released to ...
.
MSINFO32.EXE under
Windows XP
Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct upgrade to its predecessors, Windows 2000 for high-end and ...
stores system history from
WMI in the
XML
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable ...
files in
Windows\PCHealth\HelpCtr\Datacoll.
In the interest of
backward compatibility
Backward compatibility (sometimes known as backwards compatibility) is a property of an operating system, product, or technology that allows for interoperability with an older legacy system, or with input designed for such a system, especiall ...
,
WINMSD became a loader for
MSINFO32.
See also
*
List of DOS commands
This article presents a list of commands used by DOS operating systems, especially as used on x86-based IBM PC compatibles (PCs). Other DOS operating systems are not part of the scope of this list.
In DOS, many standard system commands were pro ...
*
MS-DOS
MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...
*
PC DOS
PC or pc may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Player character or playable character, a fictional character controlled by a human player, usually in role-playing games or computer games
* '' Port Charles'', an American daytime TV soap opera
* ...
*
System Information (Windows)
System Information (msinfo32.exe) is a system profiler included with Microsoft Windows that displays diagnostic and troubleshooting information related to the operating system, hardware and software. It has been bundled with Windows since Windows ...
*
System profiler
References
Further reading
*
{{Microsoft Windows components
Diagnostics
Diagnosis is the identification of the nature and cause of a certain phenomenon. Diagnosis is used in many different disciplines, with variations in the use of logic, analytics, and experience, to determine "cause and effect". In systems engineer ...
DOS software
External DOS commands