Does the physical address change when I format my computer?

Does the physical address of the wireless adapter of a laptop change if I format? The tenant of my place has a router set up and she added my laptop's physical address to the router in order for me to use the internet. If I format my computer, will I receive a new address? The tenant is currently away so I can't ask her to set up the internet for me again.

 

After formating your HDD, you will certainly need to setup the wireless adapter in your laptop again, and download the appropriate drivers and complete other processes in connection with your wireless network connection.

With the DHCP enable, the router will asign your laptop an IP address automatically again after you are finished setting up your HDD. In other words all the re-work will be in your laptop side.

 

if u mean mac address,it is a hardware based ID which won't change.

 

Yes, I forgot that, thanks.

 

I assume you are talking about the MAC. No it won't change.

 

I'm not sure what the technical term is. It's the address you enter in the router setup page in order for other devices to gain access to the wireless network.

 

sounds like the MAC address. is it a 192.168.0.0 or a 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0?

 

It's 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0, I believe. I just gave my laptop to the tenant and she went to the command prompt ipconfig and wrote down the physical address of my laptop on a piece of paper and then she went to the router setup page on her computer and entered my address there.

 

Which MAC address is that? All MAC addresses I know are not as simple as all those zeros.

 

It's not just zeros, it was just an example to show the format of the address. The real one has letters and numbers. What address do you usually enter in the router to permit other users access to the wireless internet?

 

I forgot. IPCONFIG calls it the Physical address. All of us geeks call it the MAC address. Same thing.

It's just a sample one. 6 blocks of four hexidecimals = MAC address

Like IP4 is 4 blocks of 3 decimals.
For fun, IP6 is eight block of four hexidecimals
FEC0:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000

which is usually written
FEC0::

Thank God you won't ever see static addressing in IPv6

 

Unless you want to make a very private home network and use the MAC addresses as an IP address for the users, then you enter the MAC of the nic, but normally people don't do this, rather they let DHCP to automatically asign the IP addresses to users and then you add security using WEP or WPA.

 

No, your wireless card's MAC address is programmed into the controller on the card. It doesn't change when you do a fresh reinstall of your operating system.

 

I have known the MAC address before i knew Physical address

So where is it embedded? in the network card ?

I wanna know if its possible on a laptop to change the MAC by changing network adapter

 

Don't know exactly which chip on the card contains the MAC, but it is unique to each card.

If you change the card, it will change the MAC.

 

The MAC address is indeed hard coded in the NIC card. It can be changed by removing the flash chip from the NIC card, re-programming it with new MAC address and putting it back on the card. But the software does not change the hard coded MAC address. You have to instruct Windows to use the new MAC address, otherwise Windows will continue using the previous hard coded MAC address.

If you change the NIC card then you will have another MAC address.

 

You can change the MAC on alot of cards. If you have Linux, the OS will change the MAC for ya.

Eidt: Well, technically it's called "spoofing." close enough.

 

Thanks a bunche everyone. So in short, I can fresh install windows vista on my Dell M1330 without affecting the MAC/physical address so that it can continue to be connected to the tenant's router? The tenant subleased the place to me and now she's gone for the summer. So I'll be screwed if I screw up this MAC address thing

 

You can do it with free windows software as well.

This is one of the main reasons colleges don't allow your own wireless router on campus. If you have one where its open, the student still has to authentacate their session with resnet (which is usually a 24 hour lease bound to the mac address). Well, you could look in your router and get the mac address of a computer that is idle, spoof your mac address to this, and gain access to the internet under their authentication (the schools routers will think your computer is theirs and they will likely get booted off the net). Anything you download shows up as them downloading it. Not legal and highly unethical.

On a side note about mac addresses, some countries are trying to pass bills that require users to register their mac addresses with the government.

 

Set the WEP or WPA is useful for security but remember, it is not totally safe if someone else know ur WEP... that's when MAC address comes in handy.. u can set them to filter them from accessing ur router... this is for extra safety
I started to set this when i checked some ridiculous numbers of traffics and saw weird MAC addresses coming in accessing my router.. After i set them.. POOF!!~ all weirdos are wiped away.. ahaha!!~ I dun like to change the router password cuz at the end, someone u can't trust will share the password again... so what i do is.. filter known MAC and only they can access the router...