Retrieving Windows version “1511”

Question

The latest release of Windows 10 (currently Insider Preview) is badged as:

Version 1511 (OS Build 10586.3)

when looking in \"Abo

Answer 1

FWIW, Process Monitor suggests that winver does simply query ReleaseId. So maybe that is indeed all there is to the "Version 1511" branding.

23:59:30,6022870    winver.exe  7004    RegQueryValue   HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ReleaseID SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 10, Data: 1511

Changing the registry value to something random is immediately reflected when launching winver again. Removing the value makes winver show an empty string.

So, while not nicely wrapped in an API and possibly unsupported, this seems to do the trick for now:

using (var hklmKey = Microsoft.Win32.Registry.LocalMachine)
using (var subKey = hklmKey.OpenSubKey(@"SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion"))
{
     if (subKey != null)
     {
         string release = subKey.GetValue("ReleaseId") as string;

         if (release != null)
             retVal += " Version " + release;
     }
}