We are all using Windows operating system. I am actually using Linux operating system named Fedora but as you expect I use Windows operating systems too. Windows operating systems are popular and supported for a long time after their releases. This makes the IT environment very homogeneous about Windows operating system version. A middle-size IT environment will have all versions of the Windows operating system, especially on the client-side. How can we decide the Windows operating system versions? There are different ways to find out what version of Windows operating systems we are using. We will look at some of them below.
Display Windows Version Information From System Information
The system information window is one of the most detailed ways to get information and data about the Windows operating system version. It also provides other information like Processor, memory BIOS, etc. We can quickly open this system information window with the following command in the command run box.
$ msinfo32
As we can see from the output Our operating system is Windows 7 and Ultimate. Also, there is information about the build and service pack. We can also run systeminfo command-line version to get operating system information.
$ systeminfo | findstr /C:"OS"
Display Windows Version InformationMS-DOS Command Line
Another way to get more practical information is by using command line cmd. We will provide ver command like below.
$ ver
But as we can see there will be less information about the windows version and there is no name like Vista , Xp , 8 …
Display Windows Version Information Using Wmi
Wmi is a very detailed tool used to get and set a lot of system-related information. We can also use wmi to get windows operating system versions like below.
$ wmic os get Caption,CSDVersion /value
Display Windows Version Information Using Control Panel System Page
We can also use GUI in order to find the Windows version we are using. In the Control Panel System, the page provides useful information about the system. We can check this page for Windows major and Minor versions like Home, Professional, Enterprise, Student, etc.
Windows Versions
Windows is a 30-year-old operating system family. It has released with different versions. We will provide the last 25 years of versions with the screenshot.
Windows 98
Windows 98 is an old architecture version of the Windows operating system family and currently not available but in very rare situations we can see it under the rocks.
Windows ME
Windows ME or Millennium Edition is an enhanced version of Windows 98. But uses the same kernel and provides the same experience with Windows 98.
Windows XP
Windows XP is the king of the Windows operating system family. It has been released in 2001. It is used around %20 currently. This is an incredible amount for an 18 years old operating system.
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an intermediate Windows version which is not gained widespread usage. It has some bugs and bad user experience which made it less popular than Windows XP and Windows 7. But Windows Vista provided new kernel architecture to Windows 7.
Windows 7
Windows 7 is built on Windows Vista by solving issues of Vista. It is the second king of the Windows operating system family after Windows XP. It is very popular against a long time of its availability.
Windows 8 and Windows 8.1
Windows 8 and 8.1 are designed from scratch to make the Windows Operating system perfect. Windows 8.1 is a major upgrade to Windows 8 without a license fee. Windows 8 usage is low because of upgrade options to Windows 10 and some bad user experience.
Windows 10
Windows 10 is the latest Windows operating system currently. It provides a lot of features and security to the users.
