Getting the MAC Address for AR4100 SPI flash memory

[amleng]

Hello community,

I try to program the SPI-flash memory for AR4100 wifi module. To do that I follow an app note called "Programming the AR4100 SIP and SPI-flash on the Freescale Tower". One of the items needed to be programmed is the MAC address. I assume the MAC address should be a 12-digit unique number. So my question is how can I get or generate a new MAC address for my phy chip? Is there any process we can use for our production line?

Regards,

Sina

[RadekS · Accepted solution]

As first I would like to note that generally MAC address has to be unique.

Therefore there is IEEE Standards Association where you can register block of MAC addresses in case when you produce end point devices (like routers, network cards, mobile phones with wifi,...).

So, there are two options:

If you buy wifi module as end point device, MAC address should be provided by Atheros together with wifi module.

If you buy wifi module as component and you want produce end point devices, you have to contact IEEE Standards Association and register some block of MAC addreses for your devices.

For testing purposes you can use locally administered MAC adresses (second least significant bit of first byte=1).

Few links about MAC addresses:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAC_address

http://standards.ieee.org/develop/regauth/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organizationally_Unique_Identifier

http://standards.ieee.org/develop/regauth/tut/macgrp.pdf

...