Q. How can I launch a Windows PowerShell instance to run a command from a cmd.exe prompt?

A. To start a PowerShell session, you just need to run the "start powershell" command. However, you can also pass a command through the -Command switch. If you don't want the PowerShell instance to close once the command has run, you can also pass the -NoExit switch. For example, you may want to start a number of PowerShell instances to monitor counters on two different servers. The commands below fire up four PowerShell environments, each monitoring different counters on different servers. Run the following four commands from a cmd.exe instance.

start powershell -NoExit -Command "&{ Get-Counter
 '\\savdalvs01\Cluster Shared Volumes(\ClusterStorage
\Volume1)\IO Writes' -Continuous }"

start powershell -NoExit -Command "&{ Get-Counter
 '\\savdalvs01\Cluster Shared Volumes(\ClusterStorage
\Volume1)\Redirected IO Writes' -Continuous }"

start powershell -NoExit -Command "&{ Get-Counter 
'\\savdalvs02\Cluster Shared Volumes(\ClusterStorage
\Volume1)\IO Writes' -Continuous }"

start powershell -NoExit -Command "&{ Get-Counter
'\\savdalvs02\Cluster Shared Volumes(\ClusterStorage
\Volume1)\Redirected IO Writes' -Continuous }"

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