reading content of master database at a different server

I have a query for example select * from sys.databases select * from sys.configurations I believe this information is stored at master database. I would like to have a look at configuration settings in the past. Can I restore msdb/master databases at different server as regular user databases and make sense of those mentioned queries? Looks like select * from restored_master.sys.databases just ignores current database. I know an option to replace master/msdb using startup parameters - that should work, but a bit longer option and need compatible version of server.