Problem with internet connection

[sv.akula]

I own a hp pavilion notebook and I've been using it to connect to internet. Vergin Media is my broadband provider. Suddenly this morning i experienced problems connecting to the internet. The wireless connection is working fine but no internet.

I called vergin media customer support, they say after asking me few details about my computer, my network card mac is stolen and somebody else is using my netword card mac. Hence i don't get internet connection on my laptop from virgin media. I'm really surprised how this can happen.

Please advice me what should i do now.

Thanks
Srini

[whydoIneedatech]

I own a hp pavilion notebook and I've been using it to connect to internet. Vergin Media is my broadband provider. Suddenly this morning i experienced problems connecting to the internet. The wireless connection is working fine but no internet.

I called vergin media customer support, they say after asking me few details about my computer, my network card mac is stolen and somebody else is using my netword card mac. Hence i don't get internet connection on my laptop from virgin media. I'm really surprised how this can happen.

Please advice me what should i do now.

Thanks
Srini

It annoys me when they give out information like that, what they mean is that it looks like someone on your uBR has a NIC with a duplicate MAC address, either intentionally or purely because the manufacturer was lazy and did ensure that the same MAC address was not given to another machine.

What tends to happen is only one of you willl get on the internet and the other person is unable till the other NIC comes of the internet then the reverse happens.

Usually the only way around this is to either swap your NIC, not very easy on a laptop or use a router which will give you another MAC address to put on the internet.

[Horace]

The wording seems strange, why would someone want to 'steal' a network card mac? It sounds more like it's the modem's mac that's been stolen. Doesn't the nic mac just govern whether Virgin dhcp dishes you out the same ip if it's still in the pool? I suppose I can see how that would produce the same symptoms as you're describing though.

If it really is the network card then it's possible to change it by editing the registry or use some software e.g. :
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/applications/MacIdChanger.aspx

[whydoIneedatech]

The wording seems strange, why would someone want to 'steal' a network card mac? It sounds more like it's the modem's mac that's been stolen. Doesn't the nic mac just govern whether Virgin dhcp dishes you out the same ip if it's still in the pool? I suppose I can see how that would produce the same symptoms as you're describing though.

If it really is the network card then it's possible to change it by editing the registry or use some software e.g. :
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/applications/MacIdChanger.aspx
It does happen and the customer who calls in of course is not to happy with what we have to tell them.

You can change as you say if you know what your doing, we usually tell them the other simpler options.

[sv.akula]

Surprisingly, My internet connection started working without any problem after few hours and till today no problem.