hostid gives identical values on all FC machines

Gene Heskett gene.heskett at verizon.net
Wed Dec 15 17:34:43 UTC 2004


On Wednesday 15 December 2004 08:45, Tammar K. Ajam wrote:
>James Wilkinson wrote:
>>Marvin Dickens wrote:
>>>MAC addresses contained in the eeproms of network equipment are
>>>absolutely unique and singular. There
>>>is no possibility of the a MAC address having plurality unless the
>>> MAC address in the eeprom contained in the network equipment has
>>> been altered by someone with a hex editor and an eeprom burner.
>>> Sure, you can alias the MAC address using software, but the MAC
>>> address in the eeprom is *never* altered.
>>
>>This is a lovely theory and generally true.
>>
>>But this is the computer industry. There have been various "budget"
>
>Yes it's truth.
> I test 20 MBs which had the same model no.
>All the built in Network card have the same MAC address.
>These MB was made by a company called kobian (Made in china).
>When these Card connected to a DHCP server they optain the same IP
>address on all the PC
>Tammo

I suspected as much when I found that the MAC address of the builtin
ethernet on this mobo was found to be changeable in the bios.  Then I
looked up how these are given out and found it wasn't even defaulted
to the correct mfg code.  Since arpwatch was bitching insessantly
about it, I just changed it to match the old 8139too card I took out,
and everybody seems happy.  But then I found I could fix arp, so I
reset it to the mfg number with the same last 3 nums as the linksys
card and everyone is happy again.

>>Ethernet manufacturers that have used the same MAC for an entire
>>production run, to save costs.

fscking idiots.  But if we make enough noise so a search can locate
that its a problem, maybe we can at least fix it on our end.

The alternative to the use of DHCP for address handouts is to dump
dhsp and give everyone on your local net a hardwired address in
everybodies host files.  Large network == maintainance PITA though.

>>If they go into the consumer market, there's no problem. In
>> businesses, too, provided they buy their computers individually.
>> But if you buy a multipack of really identical Ethernet cards...
>>
>>I understand that this is a real pain to track down if you haven't
>> seen it before.

Yup.  An Excedrin headache in the very large number range, probably
prime.

>>James.

-- 
Cheers, Gene
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