Setting the MAC Address from Linux

From Platformx Wiki

Using ethtool to Manipulate EEPROM

The Stargate 2 daughter card has a serial EEPROM (AT93C45A) that can store 128 bytes. The MAC address is stored at word offset 0x20 (byte offset 0x40). Ethtool displays the contents of EEPROM. For example:

[root@SG2-21 /root]#ethtool -e eth0
Offset          Values
------          ------
0x0000          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0010          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0020          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0030          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0040          00 50 c2 2f 30 13 ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0050          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0060          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0070          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 

Ethtool also modifies the EEPROM

[root@SG2-21 /root]#ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x10 value 0x1A

[root@SG2-21 /root]#ethtool -e eth0
Offset          Values
------          ------
0x0000          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0010          1a ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0020          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0030          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0040          00 50 c2 2f 30 13 ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0050          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0060          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 
0x0070          ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 

Setting the MAC Address

The MAC address is set with the script /sbin/setMAC. For example,

  [root@SG2-21 /root]#setMAC 00:50:C2:2F:30:13
  setmac to 00:50:C2:2F:30:13

The script is:

  #!/bin/bash

  echo "setmac to $1"
  numbers=(`echo $1 | tr ':' ' '`)
  # echo ${numbers[1]}

  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x40 value 0x${numbers[0]}
  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x41 value 0x${numbers[1]}
  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x42 value 0x${numbers[2]}
  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x43 value 0x${numbers[3]}
  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x44 value 0x${numbers[4]}
  ethtool -E eth0 magic 0x3A8EBEEF offset 0x45 value 0x${numbers[5]}

The setMAC script is called by px2init during Initial File System Configuration.

BLOB Note

Be sure to use the Blob from release 1.1. The 1.0 release will replace the MAC address with a default.