How to fast get Hardware-ID in C#?

Question

I need in my program to tie a license to a hardware ID. I tried use WMI, but it still slow.

I need, for example, CPU, HDD, and motherboard info.

Answer 1

I got here looking for the same thing and I found another solution. If you guys are interested I share this class:

using System;
using System.Management;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Security;
using System.Collections;
using System.Text;
namespace Security
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Generates a 16 byte Unique Identification code of a computer
    /// Example: 4876-8DB5-EE85-69D3-FE52-8CF7-395D-2EA9
    /// </summary>
    public class FingerPrint  
    {
        private static string fingerPrint = string.Empty;
        public static string Value()
        {
            if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(fingerPrint))
            {
                fingerPrint = GetHash("CPU >> " + cpuId() + "\nBIOS >> " + 
            biosId() + "\nBASE >> " + baseId() +
                            //"\nDISK >> "+ diskId() + "\nVIDEO >> " + 
            videoId() +"\nMAC >> "+ macId()
                                     );
            }
            return fingerPrint;
        }
        private static string GetHash(string s)
        {
            MD5 sec = new MD5CryptoServiceProvider();
            ASCIIEncoding enc = new ASCIIEncoding();
            byte[] bt = enc.GetBytes(s);
            return GetHexString(sec.ComputeHash(bt));
        }
        private static string GetHexString(byte[] bt)
        {
            string s = string.Empty;
            for (int i = 0; i < bt.Length; i++)
            {
                byte b = bt[i];
                int n, n1, n2;
                n = (int)b;
                n1 = n & 15;
                n2 = (n >> 4) & 15;
                if (n2 > 9)
                    s += ((char)(n2 - 10 + (int)'A')).ToString();
                else
                    s += n2.ToString();
                if (n1 > 9)
                    s += ((char)(n1 - 10 + (int)'A')).ToString();
                else
                    s += n1.ToString();
                if ((i + 1) != bt.Length && (i + 1) % 2 == 0) s += "-";
            }
            return s;
        }
        #region Original Device ID Getting Code
        //Return a hardware identifier
        private static string identifier
        (string wmiClass, string wmiProperty, string wmiMustBeTrue)
        {
            string result = "";
            System.Management.ManagementClass mc = 
        new System.Management.ManagementClass(wmiClass);
            System.Management.ManagementObjectCollection moc = mc.GetInstances();
            foreach (System.Management.ManagementObject mo in moc)
            {
                if (mo[wmiMustBeTrue].ToString() == "True")
                {
                    //Only get the first one
                    if (result == "")
                    {
                        try
                        {
                            result = mo[wmiProperty].ToString();
                            break;
                        }
                        catch
                        {
                        }
                    }
                }
            }
            return result;
        }
        //Return a hardware identifier
        private static string identifier(string wmiClass, string wmiProperty)
        {
            string result = "";
            System.Management.ManagementClass mc = 
        new System.Management.ManagementClass(wmiClass);
            System.Management.ManagementObjectCollection moc = mc.GetInstances();
            foreach (System.Management.ManagementObject mo in moc)
            {
                //Only get the first one
                if (result == "")
                {
                    try
                    {
                        result = mo[wmiProperty].ToString();
                        break;
                    }
                    catch
                    {
                    }
                }
            }
            return result;
        }
        private static string cpuId()
        {
            //Uses first CPU identifier available in order of preference
            //Don't get all identifiers, as it is very time consuming
            string retVal = identifier("Win32_Processor", "UniqueId");
            if (retVal == "") //If no UniqueID, use ProcessorID
            {
                retVal = identifier("Win32_Processor", "ProcessorId");
                if (retVal == "") //If no ProcessorId, use Name
                {
                    retVal = identifier("Win32_Processor", "Name");
                    if (retVal == "") //If no Name, use Manufacturer
                    {
                        retVal = identifier("Win32_Processor", "Manufacturer");
                    }
                    //Add clock speed for extra security
                    retVal += identifier("Win32_Processor", "MaxClockSpeed");
                }
            }
            return retVal;
        }
        //BIOS Identifier
        private static string biosId()
        {
            return identifier("Win32_BIOS", "Manufacturer")
            + identifier("Win32_BIOS", "SMBIOSBIOSVersion")
            + identifier("Win32_BIOS", "IdentificationCode")
            + identifier("Win32_BIOS", "SerialNumber")
            + identifier("Win32_BIOS", "ReleaseDate")
            + identifier("Win32_BIOS", "Version");
        }
        //Main physical hard drive ID
        private static string diskId()
        {
            return identifier("Win32_DiskDrive", "Model")
            + identifier("Win32_DiskDrive", "Manufacturer")
            + identifier("Win32_DiskDrive", "Signature")
            + identifier("Win32_DiskDrive", "TotalHeads");
        }
        //Motherboard ID
        private static string baseId()
        {
            return identifier("Win32_BaseBoard", "Model")
            + identifier("Win32_BaseBoard", "Manufacturer")
            + identifier("Win32_BaseBoard", "Name")
            + identifier("Win32_BaseBoard", "SerialNumber");
        }
        //Primary video controller ID
        private static string videoId()
        {
            return identifier("Win32_VideoController", "DriverVersion")
            + identifier("Win32_VideoController", "Name");
        }
        //First enabled network card ID
        private static string macId()
        {
            return identifier("Win32_NetworkAdapterConfiguration", 
                "MACAddress", "IPEnabled");
        }
        #endregion
    }
}

I won't take any credit for this because I found it here It worked faster than I expected for me. Without the graphic card, mac and drive id's I got the unique ID in about 2-3 seconds. With those above included I got it in about 4-5 seconds.

Note: Add reference to System.Management.

Answer 2

For more details refer to this link

The following code will give you CPU ID:

namespace required System.Management

var mbs = new ManagementObjectSearcher("Select ProcessorId From Win32_processor");
ManagementObjectCollection mbsList = mbs.Get();
string id = "";
foreach (ManagementObject mo in mbsList)
{
    id = mo["ProcessorId"].ToString();
    break;
}

For Hard disk ID and motherboard id details refer this-link

To speed up this procedure, make sure you don't use SELECT *, but only select what you really need. Use SELECT * only during development when you try to find out what you need to use, because then the query will take much longer to complete.

Answer 3

Here is a DLL that shows:
* Hard drive ID (unique hardware serial number written in drive's IDE electronic chip)
* Partition ID (volume serial number)
* CPU ID (unique hardware ID)
* CPU vendor
* CPU running speed
* CPU theoretic speed
* Memory Load ( Total memory used in percentage (%) )
* Total Physical ( Total physical memory in bytes )
* Avail Physical ( Physical memory left in bytes )
* Total PageFile ( Total page file in bytes )
* Available PageFile( Page file left in bytes )
* Total Virtual( Total virtual memory in bytes )
* Available Virtual ( Virtual memory left in bytes )
* Bios unique identification numberBiosDate
* Bios unique identification numberBiosVersion
* Bios unique identification numberBiosProductID
* Bios unique identification numberBiosVideo

(text grabbed from original web site)
It works with C#.

Answer 4

The following approach was inspired by this answer to a related (more general) question.

The approach is to read the MachineGuid value in registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography. This value is generated during OS installation.

There are few ways around the uniqueness of the Hardware-ID per machine using this approach. One method is editing the registry value, but this would cause complications on the user's machine afterwards. Another method is to clone a drive image which would copy the MachineGuid value.

However, no approach is hack-proof and this will certainly be good enough for normal users. On the plus side, this approach is quick performance-wise and simple to implement.

public string GetMachineGuid()
{
   string location = @"SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography";
   string name = "MachineGuid";

   using (RegistryKey localMachineX64View = 
       RegistryKey.OpenBaseKey(RegistryHive.LocalMachine, RegistryView.Registry64))
   {
       using (RegistryKey rk = localMachineX64View.OpenSubKey(location))
       {
           if (rk == null)
               throw new KeyNotFoundException(
                   string.Format("Key Not Found: {0}", location));

           object machineGuid = rk.GetValue(name);
           if (machineGuid == null)
               throw new IndexOutOfRangeException(
                   string.Format("Index Not Found: {0}", name));

           return machineGuid.ToString();
       }
   }
}