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My old notebook died. I was able to salvage the harddrive and are able to access it from my new laptop's Linux Kubuntu 14.4. On the old notebook I had Windows installed as a secondary system (dual boot). Now I would like to know which programs I had installed on that old Windows. How am I able to find out? I checked

Documents and Settings/Make42/AppData/

but there is hardly anything there. It is possible though that I installed hardly anything, since it was my secondary system which I rarely used. As a matter of fact it is a while ago I booted it, so my memory is a little fuzzy on the details. So back to my question:

How am I able to find out which programs I installed on Windows?

I'm having this question regarding an old

  1. a Windows XP installation
  2. a Windows 7 installation

For finding out what is what this helped: How to identify the Windows version of a dead install from Linux by having access only to its filesystem?

My own summarizing answer is below.

Off-topic: Not sure what "recovery"-tag to use. Happy about correction.

Journeyman Geek
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Make42
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    Why do I get bad rep for this question??? At least explain yourself! – Make42 Mar 18 '16 at 15:39
  • Your best bet is to use a remote registry editor: there are many such tools for both Linux and Windows (including `regedit` itself). You will find the installed software in `HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall` (single-user installs for last log-in) and `HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall` (all-user installs). If you had several users who installed software, you will need to search for the `Uninstall` key in `HKEY\USERS` to find the other users' installs. – AFH Mar 18 '16 at 17:02
  • @AFH: This does not exist. Most likely, because it is Windows XP... – Make42 Mar 18 '16 at 17:47
  • I also have an Windows 7 installation, as I found out. But there I couldn't find this either. – Make42 Mar 18 '16 at 18:11
  • I found these keys on WinXP. But you need to make sure you open the right registry hives, specifically `\WINDOWS\system32\config\SOFTWARE` (all users) and `\Documents and Settings\{user}\NTUSER.DAT` (single user). – AFH Mar 18 '16 at 18:51
  • @AFH: These two I can not open. I just see them as binary files on my linux machine. – Make42 Mar 20 '16 at 17:14
  • They _are_ binary files: you need to open them with the registry editor, as I said. Sorry if I wasn't clear. – AFH Mar 20 '16 at 17:59

3 Answers3

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You can go into Drive:\Program Files and Drive:\Program Files (x86) These are the folders where windows usually saves it's programs. Just check in there and see if there's anything you need.

JCTechie
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  • Rather than checking the "user-specifc" Desktop folder(s), I suggest checking C:\Users\$USER\AppData\Local\Programs folder(s) in addition to the `Program Files` folder(s) for non-system-wide apps. – Tom Yan Mar 18 '16 at 15:51
  • @TomYan: This does not exist - probably because you did not expect my Windows to be Windows XP (that I just found out). – Make42 Mar 18 '16 at 17:37
  • @Make42 Oh right. You mentioned `Documents and Settings`. And you mentioned that there is hardly anything in `Documents and Settings/Make42/AppData/` too. My bad. – Tom Yan Mar 18 '16 at 17:47
  • @JCTechie: This does not quite exist in the way you described. Most likely, because it is Windows XP... – Make42 Mar 18 '16 at 17:48
  • @Make42 Oh, I was thinking of windows 7. What was the actual directory under, just curious. – JCTechie Mar 18 '16 at 21:20
  • @JCTechie: Sorry for the confusion. As you can see now, I have the exactly same issue for both, a Windows 7 and a Windows XP installation. – Make42 Mar 20 '16 at 16:39
1

In order to summarize what was posted:

Windows XP

  • Drive:/Documents and Settings/All Users/AppData
  • Drive:/Documents and Settings/$USER/AppData
  • Drive:/Programs

Also, with a remote registry editor open

  • \WINDOWS\system32\config\SOFTWARE (all users)
  • \Documents and Settings{user}\NTUSER.DAT

and look for

  • HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall
  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

Windows 7

Look in

  • Drive:/Program Files
  • Drive:/Program Files (x86)
  • Drive:/Users/$USER/AppData/Local/
  • Drive:/Users/$USER/AppData/Roaming/
Make42
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If you have Windows 7, just open the file explorer and in the left panel there should be "Devices" list. In that list should be some partitions. Just mount the one which contains Windows system (mine is literally called "System") and go into "Program files".

Alexiy
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