Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark Fiber
Now, although a connected computer's operating system can be "hacked" to cause IP packets originated by the machine to contain a "soft" MAC number instead of the Media Access Controller's "hard" MAC number, it doesn't necessarily follow that its Media Access Controller will respond to incoming interrogations with packets containing the "soft" MAC number
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Yes, it does. The MAC Id is an address, just like an IP address. The ifconfig command simply tells the hardware to use one address vs. another. It doesn't get confused over which one its supposed to use.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark Fiber
(because Media Access Controllers are designed to be largely autonomous so as to "take the load off the CPU". This is why ethernet connections are vastly superior to USB connections in the context of networking.)
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You're mixing up Media Access Controller with Media Access Control Addresses. What you're describing are special ethernet chips that do some of the calculations required for TCP/IP networking that would normally have to be done by the CPU. The MAC address is simply an address, just like an IP address.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark Fiber
A home gateway router is, however, rather different. Its Media Access Controller is specifically designed to be "programmable" to take account of those ISPs who try to restrict access to a single computer by reference to its MAC number. If cloned with a client machine MAC number, a home gateway router _must_ respond to interrogation with packets containing the new MAC number and indeed use that MAC number under all circumstances.
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Not really. A home router is pretty much the same as a computer except it uses flash ram instead of a hard-disk. Most of them run Linux (a Unix variant just like Mac OS X). Setting a router to use a cloned MAC address is exactly the same as the ifconfig command. Its software would write a configuration file to the flash ram to make sure that the setting stayed when the router was reset, but you could do that on the iMac as well. It's just software.
Now, that being said, I think having Striper change the MAC address is not a permanent solution either, but it would let him go back to NTL and know it's a problem with their end.
And you're also right that if the router turns up and it works when cloned to the old G3's Mac address, than he may be best off simply accepting that and use the router.