How to tell if a machine is physical or virtual

If you’re connected via RDP to a remote machine and you would like to know if that is a Virtual or Physical machine, here’s how to do it:

First, check the tray to see if there is a Virtual Management drive in it, like VMware tools for instance. Keep in mind that it can be hidden, so this is not a safe way.

You can also open command prompt and run the following command:

systeminfo

This command will give you detailed information about your machine. Now, scroll up and find the System Manufacturer line.

If it is a Physical Machine (custom build) the result in most cases will be:

System Manufacturer: System Manufacturer

In case of custom build, it should be IBM, Dell or some other manufacturer.

If this is a VMware virtual machine, result should be:

System Manufacturer: VMware, Inc.
System Model: VMware Virtual Platform

If this is a Hyper V or a Microsoft Virtual PC machine the result should be like this:

System Manufacturer: Microsoft Corporation
System Model: Virtual Machine

Hope you’ll find this info useful.