How-To Geek
Change your Network Card MAC Address on Ubuntu
There are a lot of reasons you might want to manually set your MAC address for your network card. I won’t ask you what your reason is.
To change this setting, we’ll need to edit the /etc/network/interfaces file. You can choose to use a different editor if you’d like.
sudo gedit /etc/network/interfaces
You should see the line for your network interface, which is usually eth0. If you have dhcp enabled, it will look like this:
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp
Just add another line below it to make it look something like this:
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp
hwaddress ether 01:02:03:04:05:06
Obviously you would want to choose something else for the MAC address, but it needs to be in the same format.
sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
You will need to restart networking or reboot to take effect.
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Comments (31)
Programmer by day, geek by night, The Geek, also known as Lowell Heddings, spends all his free time bringing you fresh geekery on a daily basis. You can follow him on Google+ if you'd like.
- Published 12/31/06
Try to apt-get macchanger. Much easier to use.
via bash:
1) sudo ifconfig down
2) sudo ifconfig hw ether 11:22:33:44:55:66
3) sudo ifconfig up
thats it
The ifconfig method will only temporarily change your mac address.
try this:
sudo gedit /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh
on the bottom of the page, insert:
killall dhclient
killall dhclient3
ifconfig eth0 down
ifconfig eth0 hw ether 112233445566
ifconfig eth0 up
/sbin/dhclient
/sbin/dhclient3
anything in this file will load after the regular boot process is started up. So putting this in the file will change the mac address everytime the machine starts.
This script is good. But not working localhost & azureus etc.
You must apply:
sudo gedit /etc/network/interfaces
And paste in this file:
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp
hwaddress ether XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
The tutorial dosn’t work for me. Don’t know why.
Then I tryed procuro’s method and it works but just for a minute. Then my laptop dies, gets blocked and I can’t do nothing.
I have a wired connection and generated ip.
I found this:
****************************************************************
Open terminal and type as follow:
$ ifconfig
$ cd /etc/init.d
$ sudo nano ChangeMAC
Then, fill configuration file with new MAC Address.
sudo ifconfig eth1 down
sudo ifconfig eth1 hw ether xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
sudo ifconfig eth1 up
sudo /etc/init.d/networking stop
sudo /etc/ini.d/networking restart
Save and close the file
Apply configuration file.
$ sudo chmod +x ChangeMAC
$ sudo update-rc.d ChangeMAC defaults
Restart machine, and check new MAC Address with ifconfig command.
****************************************************************
WORKS JUST FINE!
@DX
Thanks for the update, I’ll test and change the article. I’m guessing when I wrote this it worked for an older version of Ubuntu, but not anymore.
small typo in last line of DX’s script, should be /etc/iniT.d/networking restart
thanks, btw!
Hi,
Tried all the options (not together :D), but no one didn’t fix the problem for me.
with ipconfig I still have my eth0 with my old mac adress.
Anyone new ideas?
Thanks,
Jhom
hi
I did what in the DX’s script exactly,and when I restart the machine a white screen appeared
after I logged in and I couldn’t get my desktop again
the computer is now waiting…….
for your solutions
thanks
Open terminal and type as follow:
$ ifconfig
$ cd /etc/init.d
$ sudo nano ChangeMAC
Then, fill configuration file with new MAC Address.
sudo ifconfig eth1 down
sudo ifconfig eth1 hw ether xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
sudo ifconfig eth1 up
sudo /etc/init.d/networking stop
sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
Save and close the file
Apply configuration file.
$ sudo chmod +x ChangeMAC
$ sudo update-rc.d ChangeMAC defaults
Restart machine, and check new MAC Address with ifconfig command.
****************************************************************
WORKS JUST FINE!am trying this now, i will let u know if it worked!
try this:
sudo gedit /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh
on the bottom of the page, insert:
killall dhclient
killall dhclient3
ifconfig eth0 down
ifconfig eth0 hw ether 112233445566
ifconfig eth0 up
/sbin/dhclient
/sbin/dhclient3
anything in this file will load after the regular boot process is started up. So putting this in the file will change the mac address everytime the machine starts.
this one worked in the newest Ubuntu distro year 2009 jan/feb.
ill test the other once to, if their are people who know more script or command ideas of changing mac address than post here, ill test those to!
All the time I was using the ifconfig method in some /etc/init.d startup scripts (without changemac program), but now i tried the solution from original post and i find it the best. It’s very clean, i just added the line “hwaddress ether 01:02:03:04:05:06″ to /etc/network/interfaces and after restart everything works like a charm…
oh, i almost forgot… works under Debian 5.0 Lenny {stable}
[b]for mac osx users:[/b]
sudo ifconfig en1 ether (mac-address)
*this will spoof your mac-address*
ifconfig en1 |grep ether
*this will show you your current mac-address*
sudo ifconfig eth0 down
sudo ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:a0:WH:AT:EV:ER
sudo ifconfig eth0 u
DX’s method does work properly.
I tried DX’s method and it worked but now i can’t connect to a network,
does anyone know how to revert back to defaults, i changed my mac address back to the original
in hte ChangeMAC file but still no connection,
i just wanted to know how to take out the nano ChangeMAC stuff
thanx
there’s program in GTK called MACchanger ;)
someone may try it, heres the .deb pack for ubuntu
http://packages.ubuntu.com/maverick/macchanger
$sudo apt-get install macchanger
$sudo macchanger -r eth0
This works very well! :) Thanks Phinn Fort!
Some routers don’t accept association if you are using a random mac address if the vendor is radom too then I always use
macchanger -A eth0
Network manager in Ubuntu 10.10 have option “Cloned mac address” which does exatly this thing! Super!
Try just removing /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules and then rebooting.
how to change the lan ip address in linux ubuntu
dear sir ,
i am auser of ubuntu-10.10
my laptop model is compaq preserio cq40-601tu
i want to install all the driver which i required to get a complite laptop.
plz sir give me the idea.
“b.a.
Network manager in Ubuntu 10.10 have option “Cloned mac address” which does exatly this thing! Super!”
in Ubuntu 10.10
device mac address = HWadr from iconfig ?!
what is the “cloned mac address” ?
anything I might find in a dream?
or device = clone ?
MTU = automatic?
tanks yuo. much happy now.
Can some one tell how to change MAC in DEBIAN 6 Command line no Grafikcs!
and DHCP auto ?????????
Thank you. This helped. I was having a problem where if I dual-boot windows, my etho connection would be owned by windows by my router. When I switched back to linux, I’d need to do a manual reboot of the router for my etho to be assigned to linux. The problem wasn’t vis-versa.
By doing this, my endings are now db, and dc, for the same etho card, allowing linux to have the card, and windows, regardless when I switch on the dualboot. Thanks again!