The Sensor Dial action puts one HWiNFO reading on a Stream Deck + encoder. The touchscreen shows a label, the live value with its unit, the session low/high, and a range bar; the dial and touch surface let you switch readings and stats without opening settings.
It shares its data source, themes, thresholds, and formatting with Sensor Reading keys; this page covers only what’s specific to the dial. Windows only, HWiNFO required.
The touchscreen readout
The slot draws four things, top to bottom:
| Element | Shows |
|---|---|
| Label | Your custom label, or the sensor’s own (renamed) label if you leave it blank. |
| Value + unit | The live reading, formatted per Decimals, with the unit inline. A stat badge (· MIN, · MAX, · AVG) is appended when you’re viewing a session stat instead of the live value. |
| Stats line | ▼ <low> ▲ <high> session: the lowest and highest values seen this session. |
| Range bar | A fill showing where the live value sits between the bar’s min and max. |
The bar always tracks the live value, even while you’re touching through MIN / MAX / AVG on the number above it.
Gestures
| Gesture | Effect |
|---|---|
| Rotate | Step through the readings of the same sensor source (e.g. every reading under one GPU), wrapping around at the ends. The new choice is saved. |
| Push (press the dial) | Reset the session min / max / average back to the current value. |
| Touch (tap the screen) | Cycle the displayed number: current → session min → session max → session average. |
| Long touch (touch and hold) | Jump straight back to the live current value. |
Note: Rotate only walks readings that belong to the same physical sensor as your current pick, so you can spin through, say, all of one drive’s temperatures without leaving that device. To jump to a different source entirely, use the sensor picker in settings.
Session stats are the dial’s own
Unlike keys (which read HWiNFO’s own min/max/average), the dial tracks its session stats itself, starting from when the dial appeared (or its last Push reset). They accumulate in the reading’s native unit while the dial is on a visible page, so:
- Push resets them; so does picking a different reading (rotate or the picker) or the dial reappearing.
- On the Gadget data source there is no HWiNFO min/max/avg at all, but the dial’s session stats still work because it computes them from the live stream. See Data sources.
Settings
Open the dial’s Property Inspector to configure it. Most fields mirror the key action.
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Sensor | Searchable picker over every reading HWiNFO publishes, with a live value preview. Same picker as keys. |
| Label | Custom label; blank falls back to the sensor’s name. |
| Theme | Preset gallery for this dial, or Deck default to follow the deck-wide theme. See Themes. |
| Decimals | Auto (magnitude-based; compacts large values, e.g. 48.7k) or a fixed 0–3. |
| Unit | Show temperatures in °F instead of °C. |
| Bar min | Fixed low end of the range bar. Leave blank to auto-track the session low. |
| Bar max | Fixed high end of the range bar. Leave blank to auto-track the session high. |
| Warn at | Value at which the bar fill turns amber (in the displayed unit). |
| Critical at | Value at which the bar fill turns red (in the displayed unit). |
| Direction | “Alert when value drops below thresholds” flips the comparison: for fan RPM, free space, and other where-lower-is-worse readings. |
Bar range: fixed vs. session
By default (both fields blank) the bar spans the session low → high, so the fill grows as new extremes appear and always uses the full width of the range you’ve actually seen. Set Bar min / Bar max to pin the bar to a fixed scale instead (e.g. 0 and 100 for a usage percentage, or 30 and 90 for a CPU temperature) so the fill position means the same thing every time you glance at it. You can set just one end; the other stays automatic.
Alerts on a dial
Dials take the same Warn at / Critical at thresholds as keys, compared against the live value. But the alert shows differently: only the range bar’s fill flips to the alert color (amber for warn, red for critical); the label, value, and rest of the face stay in your chosen theme.
This is by design. The touchscreen slot is too small for the full field-flip that keys use (whole key to amber/red), so the bar carries the alert while the readout stays legible. The two alert colors are global and never tinted per theme, so they stay unmistakable. For the full alert model, see Themes & alerts.
Note: Dials have no sparkline. Recent-history graphs are a key-only feature; the dial’s range bar is its at-a-glance trend indicator.
Status screens
When HWiNFO isn’t delivering data, the touchscreen shows a short two-line message instead of a reading:
| Touchscreen | Meaning / fix |
|---|---|
| Start HWiNFO / not detected | HWiNFO isn’t publishing on either interface. Start it (Shared Memory Support or Gadget reporting). |
| Shared Memory off / enable in HWiNFO | HWiNFO reports sharing disabled. Re-enable it, or rely on the Gadget fallback in Auto mode. |
| HWiNFO stalled / check sharing | Values frozen (Sensors window closed or HWiNFO stopped polling). When the dial is on the Gadget source this reads check Gadget instead. |
| Gadget empty / tick sensors | Gadget reporting is on but no values are ticked. Right-click sensors in HWiNFO → “Report value in Gadget”. |
| Access denied / un-elevate HWiNFO | HWiNFO and Stream Deck run at different privilege levels. Run both elevated or both normal. |
| HWiNFO error / restart HWiNFO | Shared memory didn’t validate (mid-restart or an incompatible version). |
Before you’ve picked a sensor, the dial shows HWiNFO / rotate to pick with the hint or use the settings panel. If a saved sensor is no longer in HWiNFO’s output, it shows Sensor missing / rotate to pick.
Advanced (deck-wide)
The dial’s Property Inspector also exposes the same global settings as keys, under Dial gestures & advanced: Deck theme, Type accents, Data source, and Poll every. These apply to the whole plugin rather than to this dial alone; they’re documented in Data sources and Themes.