Re: MAC Address and Ethx
On Mon, Dec 31, 2001 at 03:30:30PM -0500, Bob Underwood wrote:
> On Monday 31 December 2001 14:59, Ray wrote:
> > On Sun, Dec 30, 2001 at 06:36:17PM -0500, Bob Underwood wrote:
> > > I had a phone call from my Cable ISP the other day, stating that I should
> > > reconfigure my computer or risk losing connectivity. The web site they
> > > pointed me to is a windows site, basic config stuff. Later phone call to
> > > tech service (level one and level two) confirms they are going to start
> > > checking the MAC addy of the modem as opposed to my previous @home
> > > username, etc. Level one actually told me that my choices are to either
> > > find a new ISP or use windows.
> > >
> > > Is there a way to pass the modem MAC address along to the network in the
> > > ifconfig? If so, how would I do that?
> >
> > I take it this is an internal cable modem? Do you have the option to
> > switch to an external unit that connects to your system via a standard
> > ethernet card?
>
> It is an external modem.
>
> Doesn't the modem pass the mac address along as part of the protocol?
> Someone suggested this to me in a mail that show up on the list.
All of the MAC addresses on your side of the cable modem including the your
ethernet card and your cable modem's ethernet port are available to the
cable modem without any changes on your part. My guess is that the tech
support either didn't know what they were talking about or didn't do a good
job communicating this info to you.
I think it's more likely that what they really want is for the cable modem
to pass along YOUR MAC address (ie. the MAC of your ethernet card, not the
modem's) to verify that you are not trying to use the service with more than
one computer without paying extra. Doing that MIGHT require changing some
setting on the cable modem and their instructions might involve using some
sort of Windows only tool to configure the cable modem however the cable
modems I've seen (admitadly just a few) have all had a web based config tool
built in that you could access by pointing your web browser at
http://your_modems_ip_address/. It could also be that your modem is already
passing along the relivent MAC address however it is not in their database
either because they need you to tell them what your MAC address (via a beb
based form maybe) or because you've changed computers or net cards since
signing up for the service.
If the above doesn't make any sense maybe you could post the link to the
page they sent you to and someone here could try to work out what they
REALLY want from you.
--
Ray
Reply to: