Raspberry Pi Forums

Got a bit of a chicken and egg thing setting up Pi as media player - I have LAN client filtering on my router, so I need to know the MAC address of the Pi in order for it to be allowed on the network. But the Pi needs internet access to download and install raspbmc.....Unfortunately I do not want to turn off filtering because that means typing all the MAC addresses back in. I assumed that the MAC address would be supplied on a sticker or insert as it is for most network devices.

I would apppreciate any suggestions. e.g. if I put another version of Linux on first, then get the MAC address from that, set up router then re-install Raspbmc? Or is MAC 'soft' and likely to be different between linux installs?

The MAC is not soft.

Doesn't your router tell you the MAC address? Mine does in the section which allows me to assign an IP address to a MAC address.

Anyhow from the Pi if you issue the command

sudo ifconfig

it will show the MAC (HWaddr) of the interfaces.

Resolved - I just let the raspbmc install run and the MAC address appeared on the screen as part of that process. I then stuck the details in my router and rebooted the Pi.

Thanks for the help.