[ale] Jumperless ethercard

[Todd Graham Lewis]

On Wed, 3 Sep 1997, Chris Ricker wrote:

> You can also do fun stuff if you use the configuration software for one
> ne2000 clone on a different brand clone.  I've managed to change my
> hardware address that way ;-).

You booted to DOS to change your hardware address?  Why?

macduff# ifconfig eth0
eth0      Link encap:10Mbps Ethernet  HWaddr 00:40:33:24:F7:AE
          inet addr:207.69.181.206  Bcast:207.69.181.207  Mask:255.255.255.248
          EtherTalk Phase 2 addr:65280/115
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:44810 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          TX packets:42085 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          Interrupt:10 Base address:0x340 

macduff# ifconfig eth0 down
macduff# ifconfig eth0 hw ether 10:40:33:24:f7:ae
macduff# ifconfig eth0 up
macduff# ifconfig eth0
eth0      Link encap:10Mbps Ethernet  HWaddr 10:40:33:24:F7:AE
          inet addr:207.69.181.206  Bcast:207.69.181.207  Mask:255.255.255.248
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:44811 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          TX packets:42086 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0
          Interrupt:10 Base address:0x340 

macduff# ifconfig eth0 down
macduff# ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:40:33:24:f7:ae
macduff# ifconfig eth0 up
macduff# (clean up routing)

I used this on our firewalls; the hot-spare machine has the same MAC
address as the primary, and when the primary goes down you just yank
its cable and plug in the spare.  No ARP timeout, no nothing.

Virtaully all ethernet cards, inc. ne2k clones, support this.

-- 
Todd Graham Lewis       Manager of Web Engineering    MindSpring Enterprises
(800) 719-4664, x2804             Linux!               tlewis at mindspring.net