Device Property Reference
Starting with Windows Vista, the operating system supports a unified device property model that defines the representation of properties for device instances, device setup classes, device interface classes, and device interfaces.
Most of the device properties that are supported by the unified device property are also supported on Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000. However, these earlier versions of Windows do not support accessing device properties by using the property keys that are part of the unified device property model. On these earlier versions of Windows, the way a device property is represented, and the mechanism to access a property, depends on the component type and property type. These earlier representations and mechanisms are described in Device Property Representations (Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000).
For information about the set of system-defined device properties that are supported by the unified device property model, see System-Defined Device Properties. These properties are grouped into general categories and listed by their corresponding property key. The information that is provided with each property key indicates whether Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000 also support the property and, if so, provides a link to information about how to access the property on these earlier versions of Windows.
For a list of the device property functions that the unified device property model supports to access device properties on and later versions of Windows, see SetupDi Device Property Functions (Windows Vista and Later).
You can use the device property functions to programmatically obtain or set a device property in the unified device property model. You can also set or delete device properties by including an INF AddProperty directive or an INF DelProperty directive in the INF file section that installs a device-related component. For more information about how to use these directives, see Using the INF AddProperty Directive and the INF DelProperty Directive.
For information about the system-defined property data types and macros that defined for the unified device property model, see Device Property Data Types and Macros.