ntdetect.com

ntdetect.com is a component of

Windows NT startup process, and is responsible for detecting basic hardware that will be required to start the operating system

.

Overview

The bootstrap loader takes the control over the booting process and loads NTLDR. Ntdetect.com is invoked by NTLDR, and returns the information it gathers to NTLDR when finished, so that it can then be passed on to ntoskrnl.exe, the Windows NT kernel.

Ntdetect.com is used on computers that use

Extensible Firmware Interface, such as IA-64, use a method of device-detection that is not tied to the operating system.^[1]

Hardware detection operates somewhat differently depending on whether or not

Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) is supported by the hardware. It passes on the hardware details gathered from the BIOS onto the OS. If ACPI is supported, the list of found devices is handed to the kernel, Windows will take responsibility for assigning each device some resources. On older hardware, where ACPI is not supported, the BIOS

takes responsibility for assigning resources, not the operating system, so this information is passed to the kernel as well.

In addition, ntdetect.com will make a determination as to which hardware profile to use. Windows supports multiple distinct hardware profiles, which allows a single copy of Windows to work well in situations where the hardware changes between specific layouts on a regular basis. This is common with portable computers that connect to a docking station^{[citation needed]}.

In

winload.exe

, so that Windows will be able to control hardware resource allocation on every machine in the same way. Hardware profiles are also no longer supported in Windows Vista.

The information gathered by ntdetect.com is stored in the HKLM\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION key in the

boot process

.

Classes of hardware detected

Hardware identification
Hardware date & time
Bus and adapter types
SCSI adapters
Video adapters
Keyboard
Serial and parallel communication ports
Hard drives
Floppy disks
Mouse
Floating-point coprocessor
Industry Standard Architecture-based devices

Troubleshooting

To aid in troubleshooting, Microsoft has made available "debug" versions of ntdetect.com which will display detailed information about the hardware that was detected. Called ntdetect.chk, it is included in the Windows Support Tools.

Notes

^ "Microsoft Windows XP - Initial Startup and Boot Manager Phase for Itanium-based Systems". Microsoft. Archived from the original on 2005-03-24. Retrieved 2006-01-28.

References

External links

Download of ntdetect.chk for Windows 2000
Windows XP SP2 Support Tools includes ntdetect.chk for Windows XP.

[1] "Microsoft Windows XP - Initial Startup and Boot Manager Phase for Itanium-based Systems". Microsoft. Archived from the original on 2005-03-24. Retrieved 2006-01-28.

[1]