diff --git a/tools/h5diff/h5diff_common.c b/tools/h5diff/h5diff_common.c
index bf0b63a1ef..bee2c86137 100644
--- a/tools/h5diff/h5diff_common.c
+++ b/tools/h5diff/h5diff_common.c
@@ -50,7 +50,6 @@ void parse_input(int argc,
 
  if ( argc<3 )
  {
-  printf("Number of arguments is only %d\n", argc );
   usage();
  }
 
diff --git a/tools/h5dump/h5dump.c b/tools/h5dump/h5dump.c
index 8322cbc781..069a5222d6 100644
--- a/tools/h5dump/h5dump.c
+++ b/tools/h5dump/h5dump.c
@@ -3377,6 +3377,12 @@ parse_command_line(int argc, const char *argv[])
     const char          *outfname=NULL;
     bin_form = -1;
 
+     /* no arguments */
+    if (argc == 1) {
+        usage(progname);
+        leave(EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
     /* this will be plenty big enough to hold the info */
     hand = calloc((size_t)argc, sizeof(struct handler_t));
 
diff --git a/tools/testfiles/h5diff_600.txt b/tools/testfiles/h5diff_600.txt
index e925cb7eb3..aaa60f99e9 100644
--- a/tools/testfiles/h5diff_600.txt
+++ b/tools/testfiles/h5diff_600.txt
@@ -1,7 +1,6 @@
 #############################
 Expected output for 'h5diff h5diff_basic1.h5'
 #############################
-Number of arguments is only 2
 usage: h5diff file1 file2 [OPTIONS] [obj1[obj2]] 
 
 file1             File name of the first HDF5 file
diff --git a/tools/testfiles/tnofilename.ddl b/tools/testfiles/tnofilename.ddl
index 054a82965d..a516ddef51 100644
--- a/tools/testfiles/tnofilename.ddl
+++ b/tools/testfiles/tnofilename.ddl
@@ -73,4 +73,3 @@ usage: h5dump [OPTIONS] file
 
       h5dump -d /dset -b LE -o out.bin quux.h5
 
-h5dump error: missing file name