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I have Purchased five thin clients. Every time I connect them together, just one remains connected. When I check their MAC addresses, they all have the same one!

The thin client is "computer cloud fl300". It is is Linux based, but I can't reach any terminal in it. It just states "Booting OS" and then connection manager appears.

My question is: Can I reach for terminal in such like systems so I can change MAC address for each one?

Or can I configure boot devices in it?

Markus
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nux
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5 Answers5

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The MAC address must be different on each device. The manufacturer should have seen to this.* Basically your thin clients do not conform to the standard. They are in error/broken.

You can do two things:

  1. Return them as broken.
    Or at the least create a fuss at the manufacturer. This sort of thing should not happen and they need to be aware that they screwed up.

  2. Try to work around it by changing the MAC after booting but before you bring the network up. (e.g. ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:11:22:33:44:55 somewhere in your boot scripts.

Your question is basically if you can do this: The answer to that is yes.
However if you do this then:

  • Check all thin client for a sticker which proclaims which MAC they (should) use. Almost all network devices have such a sticker.
  • Make sure you do not cause a conflict with another NIC.. If you already had a sticker with a unique value on them use that. Else carefully select some which are not already in use on your network. (And be prepared for unexpected conflicts if someone brings a new device to work which just happens to have the address which you just used).
  • Document this.
  • Do not use the MAC which those five client are using atm. Change all five. (Just to prevent surprised in the future. E.g. when a 6th device gets bought and added. Or when something fails and that device reverts to its illegal MAC).


* Having said that I have seen NICs in the wild which all had the same MAC.

Hennes
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Although in theory, different machines ought have different MAC addresses, the reality is that this is at a network level. Because most machines end up on different networks, it is not an issue to have the same MAC on different networks. So some OEMs will make batches of machines with same MAC number.

It comes a problem when you buy random lots out of contracts, say to fill a room with boxes for a casual project. Such machines are just taken from the general stock, which might include duplicate MAC addresses.

We had 20 machines supplied with the same MAC.

The fix is to contact the reseller of the boxes to supply alternate boxes.

A similar but non-fixable problems comes if a machine goes to sleep, and the router assigns the IP address to a different machine that has just joined. When the first machine is woken up, it looks for the same IP.

wendy.krieger
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If you are using embedded systems then you will have to return them to the manufacturer unless you are prepared to flash the ROMs.

Gaurav Joseph
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Since no firmware update is available, and you can't access the system, a dirty fix could be putting the devices on different Vlans so they do not collide.

Have you tried the upgrade option from the interface?

Bruno9779
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Hope I'm not too late, but I found the solution to that problem. I had the same thing with 8 Thin Client FL300. In the link I've shared the necessary files to change the MAC address from the support of the company.

Link

nux
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enrique parada
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