A Media Access Control address or MAC address is a unique code assigned to every piece of hardware that connects to the Internet. Internet capable phones, Network Interface Cards for desktop or notebook computers, Wireless Access Cards, and even some memory cards are among the devices that are assigned MAC addresses.
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When a manufacturer creates a network capable piece of hardware they will assign the MAC address which will usually begin with a code that is tied to the manufacturer. The code will be unique to every device, even two devices of the same type.
There are lots of partial answers to this question - but you will probably understand it better if you read MAC address - Wikipedia HOW ARE MAC ADDRESSES USED? Every network interface in a network domain (whether it is a hard wired Ethernet networ. Your Media Access Control address, or MAC address, is a unique 12-character code (for example 00:00:00:00:00:0X) that your device uses to identify itself when connecting to a network. When you register it on My WiFi, your device will automatically connect. Media Access Control(MAC) Sublayer; MAC address is used by Media Access Control (MAC) sublayer of Data-Link Layer. MAC Address is word wide unique, since millions of network devices exists and we need to uniquely identify each. Format of MAC Address – MAC Address is a 12-digit hexadecimal number (6-Byte binary number), which is mostly.
A device’s MAC address is composed of six pairs of hexadecimal numbers. The numbers are separated by colons as in the following example:
6E:51:F5:c1:11:00
How To Find Your MAC Address In Windows 10 | Laptop Mag
MAC addresses are used at the data link layer of the OSI hardware model to allow packets to be passed directly between devices on a network. This helps to ensure that the data is sent to a physical device before being decoded and/or manipulated by a device.
A MAC address is similar to an IP address that the device also receives in that it ensures each device is unique and allows data to be passed among hardware devices. An IP address allows two devices to communicate across a LAN or network environment — normally IP addresses should also be unique and will allow the exchange of data.
Once assigned, the MAC address is used to ensure that each device connected to the LAN or other network is unique. With the recent advances in wireless networking technology, the address from a wireless card can be entered into the configuration pages for a network’s wireless router. From there the router can either allow or deny the device to connect based on its MAC address. This can provide additional security for the network.
Many people who use network connected devices will not ever need the MAC address to use the device. Some service providers will require the address of a device to be registered with them to ensure those who are paying for or are subscribed to the service are the only users who can connect. If this is the case, the MAC address can typically be found on a sticker on the device. If the device is portable, it may be printed inside the battery compartment.
How are IP addresses associated with hardware?
Clearly, there must be some way to associate an IP address to a computer, right? There is. Every hardware device that connects to the Internet has a unique identifier known as a MAC address.
What is a MAC address?
No, we are not talking about a MAC computer from Apple, Inc.
A MAC (Media Access Control) address is the physical hardware identifier for the actual network card itself; whereas, an IP address is a logical network address. A MAC address is permanently programmed into the hardware device by the manufacturer; therefore, a MAC address cannot be changed. An IP address can be changed.
This is a picture of a wireless Network Interface Controller (NIC) card from a laptop computer.
Think of it like this: Your house is physically located at: 123 Main Street, Somewhere, USA. But you send and receive calls through a telephone operator using your home phone number. The person calling does not know where your physical home address is. The nice thing is that you can change your home phone number at any time and still send/receive calls through the operator.
Remember: a MAC address is a physical address. An IP address is a logical address.
This is a picture of an Ethernet Network Interface Card (NIC) for a desktop computer.
Network Interface Controller (NIC)
How many MAC addresses does a Computer have?
Each Network Interface Controller (NIC) has its own MAC address. If you have a network card in your desktop computer, it has a MAC address. If you have a wireless network card in your laptop, that also has a MAC address. If you connect to the Internet with a smart phone, your smart phone also has a MAC address.
If you have a laptop that can connect wirelessly, or with a network cable, your laptop will have two MAC addresses (one for each network interface controller). For Example:
Wireless MAC address: 01:23:45:67:89:AB
Wired Ethernet MAC address: 01:23:45:67:89:CE
In the previous image, I have one Etherent controller, and one wireless controller. Each network controller has its own MAC address. If the computer has two Ethernet ports, it will have a MAC address for each Ethernet port. If it has dual-band wireless capability, it will have a MAC address for each wireless band. If your computer has two Ethernet ports and dual-band wireless, it will have four MAC addresses. I think you get the idea.
How do MAC addresses work?
When you router wants to send data packets to your computer with IP address ‘X’, the router needs to know what your computers MAC address is. So, the router sends an ARP broadcast request on the LAN. ARP means Address Resolution Protocol. Your router is basically trying to resolve (find) the physical address of which computer this IP address belongs to. So, the router sends a broadcast that says “hey everyone, if you have IP address X, please tell me what your MAC address is.” One of your computers will respond “Hello, I have IP address X and my MAC address is XYZ, please forward the data to my MAC address.”
The IP address is what is first used to find the right network. Once the request reaches the correct network using the IP address, ARP is what converts an IP address to a MAC address and delivers the data packet to the right computer.
TIP: ARP may sound similar to a Network Address Translation (NAT), but you need to understand that NAT is used for addressing and locating networks; whereas, ARP is used to deliver the actual data to the physical device.
Once again, let’s use the address and telephone number example to break this down into a digestible example:
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- The telephone operator is, let’s say, your NAT server (router).
- You have a private home phone number (your private IP address).
- You have a physical home address located at 123 Main St, Somewhere, USA (let’s say this is your computers MAC address).
- The operator (router) receives a call for you and forwards the call (using the ARP protocol) to your home phone number (your private IP address).
- The person trying to reach you is trying to deliver a package to your home address (in this case, the package is a data packet).
- But since you don’t want them knowing where your home is located, you tell the operator (the router), that you’re expecting a package and that when it arrives, to send it to your physical Address (the MAC address).
From a technical viewpoint, it looks more like this:
The laptop says “who has IP address 192.168.1.1”? (which is the routers IP address). “Please tell 192.168.1.2” (tell me, the laptop, because I’m trying to send/receive data).
The router responds, “I have IP address 192.168.1.1 and I see that you’re calling from 192.168.1.2 so I’ll forward all data packets to your physical MAC address 01:23:45:67:89:AB.”
How to find my MAC address
Step 1. Click the ‘Start’ menu
Start Menu
Step 2. Open the command prompt window
Navigate to: Accessories > Command Prompt
Right-click and choose ‘Run as Administrator’.
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Step 3. Type ‘ipconfig /all’ into the command prompt
Windows CMD prompt
Step 4. Locate the Network Interface Controller (NIC) and look for “Physical Address.”
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What are the components of a MAC address?
Identify Equipment By Mac Address
A MAC address is 48 bits long and is commonly written as a sequence of 12 digit hexadecimal digits. The first six hexadecimal digits identify the manufacturer. The last six digits represent the serial number of the device. Consequently, every MAC address is unique.
The first six digits are known as the Organizational Unique Identifier (OUI) which is assigned by the IEEE Standards Association. Therefore, if you have a device and you are unsure who manufactured it, you can perform a search online using the Associations website:
http://standards.ieee.org/develop/regauth/oui/public.html
Ok, let’s recap:
• IP addresses are logical addresses used to find networks
• MAC addresses are physical hardware identifiers programmed into a device
• MAC addresses are communicated within the boundaries of a single network such as your LAN