USBDeview (64-bit)

CNET Editors' review

by: CNET staff on May 13, 2012

It's easy to know which USB devices are plugged into your system. Just look, right? But what if they're connected on the back panel, and it's a royal pain to access them? Suppose one or more device has stopped working, and you're not even sure if they're still plugged in? Maybe you suspect one of your USB ports is malfunctioning, or you're trying to resolve a device conflict. NirSoft's USBDeview is a free system tool that can help with all those issues and more. It does something simple: display the USB devices connected to your system, including detailed information about the port, hub, device type, and more. It remembers devices you install and remove, too. USBDeview can also disable and uninstall USB devices in your system and even in remote systems on your network, as long as you have Administrator privileges. It's available in separate downloads for 32-bit and 64-bit Windows. We tried the 64-bit version.

USBDeview is portable freeware, which means it can run from any directory without having to be installed. We clicked the program's extracted executable file, and USBDeview opened with our test system's installed USB devices displayed in a basic but very detailed list view, including recently removed devices that showed as Not Connected. Customizable column headings displayed everything from basic product information to Driver Version, Instance ID, Power needs (in milliamps) and whether the device was safe to remove or not. We could drag the headings into place and add or remove them from the view using the column tool on the View menu. Selecting and right-clicking any of the devices listed in the main window called up a menu that let us disconnect, uninstall, disable, and enable the device; open the entry in RegEdit; select AutoPlay options; and open a detailed Properties sheet that we could make changes to, such as adding serial numbers and other data. USBDeview also creates reports from selected items, including individual entries or the entire list.

USBDeview 64-bit is just the sort of program that it's helpful to have around when you need to troubleshoot a balky USB device.

Publisher's Description

From NirSoft Freeware:

USBDeview (64-bit) is a small utility that lists all USB devices that currently connected to your computer, as well as all USB devices that you previously used. For each USB device, extended information is displayed: Device name or description, device type, serial number (for mass storage devices), the date or time that device was added, VendorID, and ProductID. USBDeview also allows you to uninstall USB devices that you previously used, and disconnect USB devices that are currently connected to your computer. You can also use USBDeview on a remote computer, as long as you login to that computer with admin user.

What's new in this version: Version 2.22 has fixed USBDeview to add header line to the csv/tab-delimited files when exporting the USB information from command-line.