Getting The Hard Drive Serial Number

unit Unit1; interface uses Windows, Messages, SysUtils, Classes, Graphics, Controls, Forms, Dialogs, StdCtrls; type TForm1 = class(TForm) Button1: TButton; procedure Button1Click(Sender: TObject); private { Private declarations } public { Public declarations } end; var Form1: TForm1; implementation {$R *.DFM} procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject); var VolumeSerialNumber : DWORD; MaximumComponentLength : DWORD; FileSystemFlags : DWORD; TheSerialNumber : String; begin if GetVolumeInformation('C:\',nil,0,@VolumeSerialNumber, MaximumComponentLength,FileSystemFlags,nil,0) then begin TheSerialNumber := IntToHex(HiWord(VolumeSerialNumber), 4) + IntToHex(LoWord(VolumeSerialNumber), 4); end; ShowMessage('The drive serial number is: '+TheSerialNumber); end; end.

Comments

Every hard drive has a distinctive Volume Serial Number, with the chances of any two drives you encounter having the same serial number astronomically high.  For this reason, the Volume Serial Number is often used as part of copy protection schemes.  One caution is that operating system re-installations and upgrades may change a Volume Serial Number, and formatting certainly will.

In this example, the serial number for drive C: is returned in the string variable TheSerial Number, converted to hexidecimal format as the integer format is rather unwieldy.  TheSerialNumber will contain an empty string if the drive is unavailable.

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