Biological Systems Engineering

Obtaining Your Computer Network Physical Address

All computers have a unique embedded address assigned to each network function, wired and wireless. This is commonly referred to as the network MAC address or the network physical address.

It consists of 12 hexadecimal digits in the following format:

00:01:09:AB:CD:EF

To determine the MAC address of your Windows computer proceed as follows:

You will need the 'RUN' Command.

It is accessed via the 'START' command. You should see the RUN command. If not, you will need to enable it through the START properties window.

Right Click on the 'START' menu icon and select 'PROPERTIES'

Select 'Customize...' and then check the 'Display Run' check box.

Click OK

With the 'RUN' command accessible from your START menu, select START then RUN and then type CMD.

You are launching a DOS window. Type in the command below.

GETMAC /FO LIST /V

getmac results

You should see your network adapters displayed.

Record the 'Physical address' for your 'Wireless Network Connection' and for your 'Local Area Connection'. Ignore the '1394' and 'Bluetooth' connections.

In the above window, the Physical Address (MAC) for my local area connection is 00:15:c5:1f:74:2a

In the above, my wireless card is disconnected.

Record the numbers for your computer making sure you label each one as to whether it is a wireless or wired connection. Use colons (:) to separate the numbers instead of a dash as the WSU registration site will require colons.

Windows VISTA is similar

Do you have your NETWORK ID? If yes, you are now ready to setup you computer.