MAC address changed on PS3?

[Branden]

the other day my PS3 kept getting a DNS error when trying to go online, i spend half an hour trouble-shooting the cause until i finally figured out the MAC address had changed on the PS3. the reason it caused me a problem is because i use a MAC filter on my router, so any unapproved MAC is denied access.

has anyone else noticed this? has sony said anything about this? is there a way i can make it not change again? what would be sony's point of doing this?

[BluLobsta]

Originally Posted by Branden

the other day my PS3 kept getting a DNS error when trying to go online, i spend half an hour trouble-shooting the cause until i finally figured out the MAC address had changed on the PS3. the reason it caused me a problem is because i use a MAC filter on my router, so any unapproved MAC is denied access.

has anyone else noticed this? has sony said anything about this? is there a way i can make it not change again? what would be sony's point of doing this?

I thought the MAC address only changes if the hardware changes.

[desmond]

did u change your nic?

[caliminius]

Originally Posted by Branden

the other day my PS3 kept getting a DNS error when trying to go online, i spend half an hour trouble-shooting the cause until i finally figured out the MAC address had changed on the PS3. the reason it caused me a problem is because i use a MAC filter on my router, so any unapproved MAC is denied access.

has anyone else noticed this? has sony said anything about this? is there a way i can make it not change again? what would be sony's point of doing this?

I'm going to say the issue is probably on the router's side and not the PS3's side. The MAC address of the PS3 can't change unless you were to somehow change the networking hardware in the system. Chances are the MAC address somehow got changed in the router's list.

Out of curiousity, did you switch the PS3 from a wired to a wireless connection? I think the wired and wireless hardware have different MAC addresses, which would have caused the problem had you switched from one to the other.

[Snowgod]

Each Network Interface Card (wired and wireless) has its own unique chipset with an encoded mac address. It cannot change.

[Branden]

Originally Posted by BluLobsta

I thought the MAC address only changes if the hardware changes.

you can spoof a MAC address, but you're right, i don't believe it can actually be changed.

Originally Posted by desmond

did u change your nic?

no, nothing regarding PS3's network setup has changed. the only thing i've changed is added a new laptop's MAC a few months ago.

Originally Posted by caliminius

I'm going to say the issue is probably on the router's side and not the PS3's side.

no. i backup my router's settings whenever they get changed. i did reload the most recent old one, no settings were changed.

Originally Posted by caliminius

Out of curiousity, did you switch the PS3 from a wired to a wireless connection?

no, it has always been wired.

Originally Posted by caliminius

I think the wired and wireless hardware have different MAC addresses, which would have caused the problem had you switched from one to the other.

actually now that you mention it, because i use MAC filter instead of encryption, when i first setup the PS3 i did notice the wired and wireless shared the same MAC. but now they each have their own.

i can say my PS3's MAC used to be 00:17:9A:9D:xx:xx (for both wired and wireless) and it's wired is now 00:19:C5:31:xx:xx. now that i know it can happen i know where to look next time, i'm just wondering why and if it'll happen again.

[slaizer2000]

really can't happen unless someone changes it with some spoofing s/w. Some nic do have spoofing built into them. Likely hood of it changing by itself is unlikely. I would be concerned someone hacked it and tried to change it for whatever reason. On a pc someone could hack in and do this. NOt 100% sure if the nic on a PS3 would be susceptabile to have this done.

[raaven13]

Originally Posted by Branden

i can say my PS3's MAC used to be 00:17:9A:9D:xx:xx (for both wired and wireless) and it's wired is now 00:19:C5:31:xx:xx. now that i know it can happen i know where to look next time, i'm just wondering why and if it'll happen again.

The 00:17:9A MAC belongs to a D-Link device, the 00:19:c5 belongs to Sony corp. (the first 3 sets of a MAC belongs to a corporation, so anything manufactured by that corp will start with the same 6 characters).

[Papi4baby]

I am not a computer engineer, but i bet there's a way to change it besides spoofing. I haven't had any problems with my wifi connection. But it just does not get full speed, with a 100% signal from the Dlink DIR-655

P.S. My laptop will get full speed from teh same router with less signal on a different floor of my house

[Marquoz]

Is your router or any software on the network locally assigning MAC addresses? It's very easy to over ride the burned in original value.

[caliminius]

Originally Posted by Branden

no. i backup my router's settings whenever they get changed. i did reload the most recent old one, no settings were changed.

Did you compare the most recent settings to some of the previous one's? The most likely answer is still that the router settings got changed somehow (not sure how that happens, but I experienced that once with my previous router though it wasn't MAC filtering).

I highly doubt Sony updated your PS3's MAC address, otherwise you'd think it would have happened with everyone's PS3. People would have noticed such an event (at least everyone with MAC filtering turned on would have).