Before you can reason about hardware identifiers, it helps to see your own. Windows exposes most of them with built-in tools — no extra software required.
The machine GUID
Open Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography. The MachineGuid value is a unique ID Windows generated when it was installed. Many anti-cheats read it.
Disk volume serials
Open Command Prompt and run vol C:. The "Volume Serial Number" it prints is assigned to the partition when it is formatted. Repeat for each drive letter.
MAC addresses
Run getmac /v in Command Prompt. Each physical network adapter has a MAC address — a hardware identifier assigned to the network card.
Motherboard and firmware IDs
Run wmic csproduct get UUID for the SMBIOS UUID, and wmic bios get serialnumber for the BIOS serial. These come from the motherboard's firmware. On newer Windows builds the equivalent PowerShell command is Get-CimInstance Win32_ComputerSystemProduct.
Why the distinction matters
As you collect these, notice that they come from different layers. The machine GUID lives in the registry. Volume serials live on the disk. MAC addresses live in the network adapter's configuration. The SMBIOS UUID and BIOS serial live in firmware. That last group is the hardest to change — firmware is not something ordinary software rewrites — which is why anti-cheats that read it produce the most durable fingerprints.
The takeaway
Five minutes with built-in Windows tools gives you the same picture an anti-cheat builds. Knowing your own identifiers — and which layer each one lives in — turns vague worry about "HWID" into something concrete you can actually reason about.