Drivers Harvester - Command Line Tool for Collecting OEM System Drivers

Richard Hay, Senior Content Producer

December 20, 2016

5 Slides
Drivers Harvester - Command Line Tool for Collecting OEM System Drivers

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Some of you may already be familiar with this command line tool because it has been around since November of 2013 but I thought since it received a recent update it would be a good time to remind you about it and introduce it to new users.

Drivers Harvester was created by Alex Semibratov from Microsoft and according to the original blog post about it from 05 November 2013, it was built to fill a need identified by a colleague to grab drivers from a running computer.

By the way - that blog post also has the download link for Drivers Harvester.

The simple command line tool has been updated a couple of times in 2015 and now as 2016 is coming to a close the author has given the tool another small tweak.

The usage instructions are very straightforward:

HarvestDrivers.exe

with no parameters will ask you for a directory where to save drivers

HarvestDrivers.exe -d "Full path"

will capture drivers and save them to target directory.

Just change the directory name in the quotes after -d to choose your own directory name.

When you run this command line tool it will create two sub-folders:

  • LoadedOEMDrivers - any drivers that are loaded into memory

  • OtherOEMDrivers - the remaining OEM drivers that are not loaded into memory and older driver versions.

Check out the gallery to see screenshots of my use of the tool on my own desktop system.

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About the Author

Richard Hay

Senior Content Producer, IT Pro Today (Informa Tech)

I served for 29 plus years in the U.S. Navy and retired as a Master Chief Petty Officer in November 2011. My work background in the Navy was telecommunications related so my hobby of computers fit well with what I did for the Navy. I consider myself a tech geek and enjoy most things in that arena.

My first website – AnotherWin95.com – came online in 1995. Back then I used GeoCities Web Hosting for it and WindowsObserver.com is the result of the work I have done on that site since 1995.

In January 2010 my community contributions were recognized by Microsoft when I received my first Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award for the Windows Operating System. Since then I have been renewed as a Microsoft MVP each subsequent year since that initial award. I am also a member of the inaugural group of Windows Insider MVPs which began in 2016.

I previously hosted the Observed Tech PODCAST for 10 years and 317 episodes and now host a new podcast called Faith, Tech, and Space. 

I began contributing to Penton Technology websites in January 2015 and in April 2017 I was hired as the Senior Content Producer for Penton Technology which is now Informa Tech. In that role, I contribute to ITPro Today and cover operating systems, enterprise technology, and productivity.

https://twitter.com/winobs

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