Lightweight Windows tray utility for laptop power, battery, thermal, and process monitoring. It can switch Dell BIOS battery charge settings through Dell Command | Configure cctk.exe when Dell hardware/tools are available, and it shows a compact live dashboard for battery, CPU, processes, power modes, and optional HWiNFO sensors.
PowerTray is an early public beta. It was designed and tested on a Dell XPS 14 (2026), and Dell battery mode switching should also work on other Dell laptops supported by Dell Command | Configure. Hardware support can vary by model, BIOS version, Windows version, and available sensors.
- Windows 11 x64
- .NET 8 Desktop Runtime or .NET 8 SDK
- Dell Command | Configure Application is required for Dell BIOS battery charge setting changes. Download it from Dell: Dell Command | Configure Application.
- Optional: HWiNFO with Shared Memory Support enabled for the most reliable advanced sensors
- Optional: built-in LibreHardwareMonitor sensor provider for advanced sensors without running HWiNFO
Default cctk.exe paths checked automatically:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Dell\Command Configure\X86_64\cctk.exeC:\Program Files\Dell\Command Configure\X86_64\cctk.exe
If neither path exists, open Settings and browse to cctk.exe.
Use the installer from the release page. The installer requests administrator access because it registers the optional PowerTray battery-impact helper service.
The helper service lets the tray app read Windows battery impact data without running the full UI as Administrator. The dashboard, settings, power-plan switching, battery history, and basic monitoring work without running PowerTray as Administrator.
From the repo root:
dotnet build .\PowerTray.slnx -c ReleaseTo publish the app and helper service folders:
dotnet publish .\PowerTray\PowerTray.csproj -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained false -p:UseAppHost=false
dotnet publish .\PowerTray.Service\PowerTray.Service.csproj -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained false -p:UseAppHost=falseThe project uses UseAppHost=false by default, so CLI builds produce PowerTray.dll and PowerTray.Service.dll. Run the tray app from the publish folder with:
dotnet PowerTray.dllThe app does not require administrator rights for the dashboard, settings, reading current status, power-plan switching, or normal battery history. Dell BIOS battery mode changes require elevation because they are applied through Dell Command | Configure.
When you manually select a battery preset, the app checks whether it is already elevated. If it is not, it launches only the needed helper command through UAC, captures the elevated cctk.exe result through a temp JSON handoff, and shows the command result in the dashboard status area.
Windows battery impact data also needs elevated access. The installer registers a local helper service named PowerTrayBatteryImpact for this, so the tray UI can stay unelevated. If the helper service is not installed or not running, PowerTray shows a message in the battery impact panel instead of silently failing.
The app does not repeatedly write BIOS settings. It writes only when you manually choose a battery mode.
Uninstall PowerTray from Windows Settings > Apps > Installed apps. The uninstaller removes the PowerTrayBatteryImpact helper service.
User settings and logs are stored under %AppData%\PowerTray. You can delete that folder after uninstalling if you want to remove local app data too.
- Battery Health:
Custom:50-80 - Balanced:
Custom:70-90 - Charge to Full:
Standard - Primarily AC Use:
PrimAcUse - Adaptive:
Adaptive
The custom ranges can be changed in Settings.
The dashboard is a compact fixed-size dark window designed to show the key tray-utility information without scrolling:
- Header with app title, Modes flyout, Settings, and window controls
- Status chips for AC/battery state, power mode, Energy saver state, and current Dell charge mode
- Battery and CPU summary cards with friendly labels instead of raw
cctk.exeoutput - Rolling 10-minute chart cards for battery watts and CPU / GPU usage
- Current / average / minimum / maximum stats in each chart header
- Battery usage history with power-plan, charge, charge-hold, sleep, missing-data, and Energy saver indicators
- Windows battery impact data when the helper service or administrator access is available
Memory, fan, and raw sensor details are intentionally kept out of the main dashboard so the tray popup stays dense and readable.
Click the CPU / GPU usage card to open the detailed usage view. It expands the CPU graph, keeps GPU usage visible, and replaces the older top-peaks list with a smoothed CPU driver/process list. This helps answer "what has been driving CPU recently?" without relying on the constantly jumping process order in Task Manager.
Click a battery usage block to open the detailed battery usage view. The selected range stays highlighted, and the lower panel shows Windows battery impact data for that time range when elevated access or the helper service is available. The graph also shows charge, charge-hold, sleep, missing-data, power plan, average watts, and Energy saver periods.
The dashboard tries advanced sensors in this order:
- HWiNFO shared memory, if enabled and available
- Built-in LibreHardwareMonitor provider, if enabled
- Windows fallback stats
HWiNFO remains the most reliable source. Enable HWiNFO Shared Memory Support and keep the HWiNFO sensors window active when you want its exact sensor table.
LibreHardwareMonitor runs inside this app, so you do not need a separate HWiNFO background process. It can expose CPU temperature, CPU package power, fan RPM, and sometimes battery charge/discharge watts depending on hardware and permissions. On some systems it may require administrator rights or may not expose every Dell sensor. If only some sensors are available, the dashboard shows LHM partial and logs the visible sensor list for troubleshooting.
If HWiNFO shared memory is unavailable, the app keeps running with Windows fallback stats:
- Battery percentage and AC status
- Estimated battery time if Windows exposes it
- CPU usage estimated from process CPU deltas
- Memory totals
- Top CPU and memory processes
The app does not fake missing temperature, fan, package-power, or watt values. Unavailable chart panels show unavailable stats until HWiNFO, LibreHardwareMonitor, or Windows exposes the relevant sensor.
Settings:
%AppData%\PowerTray\settings.json
Logs:
%AppData%\PowerTray\logs\app.log
No telemetry, analytics, or network calls are used.
- HWiNFO and LibreHardwareMonitor sensor names vary by machine; matching is flexible but should be validated on each target laptop.
- Per-process battery drain is not available from Windows as exact watts. The "Estimated Energy Impact" view is an estimate based on accumulated CPU activity and battery discharge rate when available.
- The energy history is persisted to
%AppData%\PowerTray\energy-history.jsonand resets when a new discharging session begins. - Windows usually does not expose fan RPM or CPU package temperature without vendor/third-party sensors.
- The installer registers the PowerTray battery-impact helper service so Windows battery impact can be read without running the tray UI as Administrator.
PowerTray is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0. See LICENSE.
PowerTray is a personal project shared for free. If it saves you time and you want to support continued development, donations are welcome but completely optional.
Donation link: ko-fi.com/andreys
Testing on other Dell laptops, opening issues, sharing feedback, and suggesting useful features also helps a lot.