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Finding your computer's MAC address

MAC is short for Media Access Control.

The MAC address is the hardware address of your network card. Your computer might have it written on the back or underneath. It will consist of 12 characters, including numbers in the range 0-9 and usually some letters in the range A-F. It may have a dash or a colon between each pair of characters. An example would look like one of these:

0015E7F532DB
00-15-E7-F5-32-DB
00:15:E7:F5:32:DB

It may be called the MAC address, Ethernet ID or Physical Address. Note that we need the MAC address for the network card, not the one for the wireless connection. This has its own MAC address, so if we get sent that one by mistake the connection won't work.

1) Go to the Control Panel. To do this:

Windows 10: Click on the Start button, bottom left of the screen. In the search box type in 'Control Panel' and click on on the Control Panel.

Windows 8: On the Start screen, right-click anywhere on the background to make the
'All apps' icon appear. Click on that, then click on the '-' symbol at the bottom right of the
screen. Choose 'Windows System', then 'Control Panel'.

Windows 7 and Vista: Click  on the Start button and choose Control Panel. 

2) Find your adapter. To do this:

Windows 10: Click on 'Network and Internet', then 'Network and Sharing Center', then 'Change Adapter Settings'

Windows 8 and 7: Click on 'Network and Sharing Center', then 'Change Adapter Settings'

Vista: Click on 'Network and Sharing Center', then 'Manage Network Connections'

3) Find the MAC address:

Windows 10, 8, 7 and Vista: Right click on the icon called 'Local Area Connection' or something similar (NOT the wireless icon, which has a different MAC address) and choose 'Properties'. Allow the mouse pointer to hover over the description in the 'Connect using' box and your MAC address will appear.

Click on the Start button, choose 'Run...' and type

cmd

In the window that comes up, type

getmac

and press return. The MAC address will appear, under the 'Physical Address' header.
If there is more than one you can get more details by typing

ipconfig /all

and pressing return. The correct one will be called 'Ethernet adaptor Local Area
Connection' (or something similar) and will be called the Physical Address.

If you get the message  'Media State........ Media Disconnected', try running the
above commands again with an Ethernet cable plugged in if possible.

From the dock choose System Preferences. Click Network and then choose Ethernet (or the adapter if you're using one - the adapter must be plugged in to your computer to show up properly). Click 'Advanced', then 'Hardware' and you'll see the MAC address.

If you run into problems feel free to contact the IT Office and we will be happy to help.

Contact details

IT Office
Room K4 & K2
01223 (3)36438
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