Can't connect to the internet with broadband cable modem or wireless

Many cable modem providers require that you register the MAC address of your equipment with them before they'll allow your modem to distribute an IP address to you. The ISP is your first choice to call for this. However, if the MAC registration is changed to a new number, you'd have to call them again to switch it to another device.

Does your cable modem include wireless? If not then you are seeing your neighbors' wireless networks.

If you have an ISP that does require the PC's MAC address to be registered then get a router that has the feature to clone MAC addresses.

1. On the desktop PC open a command prompt and run: ipconfig /all
2. write down the MAC address of the desktop PC.
3. unplug the ethernet cable from the desktop PC and plug it into the wireless router's WAN port.
4. plug a second ethernet cable into one of the router's other ports then plug the other end into the desktop PC.
5. turn on the router. wait about 30 seconds for the router to boot.
6. using your web browser, enter the router's setup. Go to the section for assigning the router's MAC address (note: this is not the same as the MAC address table for wireless PCs - which is found in the wireless setup).
7. enter the MAC address of your desktop PC. Save the changes. The router will most likely have to reboot itself for the change to apply.

You are done. The cable modem sees a connection (the router) with the registered MAC address. It does not care what PCs are connected to the router because all traffic that goes through the router will use the MAC address that you stored in the router itself.

Now you can set up the wireless part of the router and your i6000 should get to the internet with no problems.

of course you can connect your modem directly to your laptop if you want withthout the need for a router.



i have alaways found NETGEAR to be the best in this area so get a netgear router

...But if echomoon's ISP still requires the MAC address to be registered with them then contacting the ISP and adding the notebook will orphan the desktop PC. This is solved by a MAC cloning router.

Is it a cable modem? DSL? cellular broadband? (edit - nevermind, saw the thread title was "cable modem")

What model/brand?

my cable modem has a built in web server that I can hit with a browser and it tells me the status of the link between the cable modem and the ISP. I have too many splitters on my incoming cable, and had to be sure to tap off for the cable modem from the first splitter to be able to get enough signal strength to the modem for it to sync and lock.

I had to provide the MAC address of my cable modem, not my computer, to my ISP, but what is hooked up to the modem on the network side doesn't matter to my ISP.

When the someone you used to know hooked up to this modem and it worked, was that as the modem is hooked up now in your place, or was that another time/another place?

Don't know who your ISP is, but I was able to find an installation/User Manual for the SB4200 at http://broadband.motorola.com/consum...User_Guide.pdf


If someone else can hook up their PC to the modem right now and it works, then I'd suspect the network configuration on your PC, perhaps going through the network config steps in the manual would help.

I don't think getting a router will help you interface the computer to the modem, it will just add one more thing in the chain, one more thing that could be misconfigured and keeping it from working. You should get the modem to PC working, then after it is resolved, add a router if you need one. But I would think adding one at this point will just make it harder to troubleshoot.

Your ISP may not require you telling them the MAC address of your modem, but I would expect them to require that. A MAC address is an address that is assigned to the hardware itself, it's not configurable, and is unique to the modem. Sort of like a network device fingerprint. The cable company probably needs to know what the MAC address of your modem is so that they can configure the equipment on their end to recognize your modem as a valid subscriber. If they didn't require the modem's MAC address, then due to the nature of cable anyone with cable could hook up a cable modem and get broadband service without signing up and paying for it. You might want to double check with the ISP on that. The SB4200 manual says on page 6:

I re-read your first post, and perhaps I was confused. It looks like you are saying that this cable modem works just fine with your desktop computer, but when you try to hook it up to your new laptop, the laptop can't access the internet. If so, then all the stuff about registering the modem's MAC address doesn't apply because the modem is already working.

Perhaps double check the laptop's network configuration per the SB4200 manual, the W2K steps are probably close enough to what is required for XP.

I'd expect all you should have to do is hook up the ethernet cable between the modem and the laptop, and configure the laptop ethernet TCP properties to automatically obtain IP address and DNS.

Can your laptop access the Surfboard's internal webserver? (I personally have a Surfboard 5200...FYI)


It's at 192.168.100.1 => on your Firefox/Internet Explorer/Mozilla/whatever URL page, type either http://192.168.100.1 or simply 192.168.100.1

If you can, you most likely have a DNS problem (or possibly, a DHCP problem). In either case, you can find the info you need via ipconfig-> mentioned above by V.B.
There are more graphical ways to get this information, but this is the easiest (for me), most direct way to the IP information.

EDIT: I should add...
DNS => Domain Name Server = way for you to use names instead of IP address (e.g. www.google.com instead of 72.14.207.99)
DHCP => Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol = way for your laptop to get automatically assigned an IP address (which you should see in the data displayed from your "ipconfig" command)

same problem

I have the same problem. I unplugged cable modem and shut off my 9300. Turned on modem then computer and it still says little or no connectivity. Any other suggestions? Just bought system. Same cable modem works on the desktop fine. Thanks in advance. Also, when i type in ipconfig /all, it does not stay up on the screen long enough to read the information. Thanks

--IPCONFIG visibility problem:
run the command in a command tool...
START->run...->type in "cmd" without the quotes, hit enter.
You should now have a command window up on your screen. Type the "ipconfig" commands in there, and the results will be stay visible.