Hardware/IT equipment are pretty much the same thing and can be any piece of computer machinery, yes it does include switches, hubs, routers and other networking hardware but also peripherals (k/board, mouse, what have you...) and the stuff inside the boc (CPU, RAM, hard drives, motherboard, PSU, everything). Installing hardware is just simply, well, throwing it in/hooking it up and configuring is actually setting it up/making it work they way you want it to.
