Get BIOS Publish date & other BIOS characteristics

[jbs]

I've been looking most of the day for how, within VC++, I can get the BIOS publish date...and if possible other information about the BIOS version installed on the motherboard.

The platform SDK has a Win32_BIOS class that has a whole lot of characteristics about the BIOS looks like it was made to work for this application but I can't find any sample code or figure out how to use the class. Does anyone know of where I can find a great example of the use of this class?

....another method to get the publish date of the bios is via a direct read of memory (which I don't know how to do). Using the debug utility, and from some readings, the bios publish date is located at ffff:0005h and goes on for 8 bytes.

I'd prefer to figure out how to use the Win32_BIOS class which is part of the WMI set of classes, but the documentation is rather minimal......

Does anyone have any ideas or sources that will obtain the basic BIOS information?

thanks,

 

[IonelBurtan]

Look for the following in MSDN:
- Win32_SMBIOSMemory class
and
"Computer System Hardware Classes "

You will have to use the IWbemServices interface.

Hope this helps,

s-)

Blessed is he who in the name of justice and goodwill, sheperds the weak through the valley of darkness...

http://www20.brinkster.com/ionelb

 

[jbs]

I agree with you. The "Computer System Hardware Classes" seem to be the right way to go and they provide a lot of info on the system. I've also seen a lot of other threads that ask a similar question on various newgroups.

The problem I'm having is finding a book or article that provides good sound examples on how to use, for example, the Win32_BIOS class.

MSDN refers to the "Computer System Hardware Classes " in the Platform SDK, but it's lacking some good examples. The website also is lacking (..or at least I can't find it).

If anyone can provide some references or sample code that would be great.

thanks,