NEWBIE: Logging into Cox Cable service

[Eric Crist]

On Sunday 11 July 2004 10:10, you wrote:
> I am running FreeBSD 4.10 and am trying to connect to my Cox ISP via a an
> Ethernet nic and cable modem.
>
> I have DHCP for the nic enabled in /etc/rc.conf and can obtain an IP
> address from my Windows 98 gateway, but when I connect the nic to the cable
> modem and reboot I do not get a response from the cox DHCP server.
>
> The nic shows active in ifconfig, but no IP is assigned to it.
>
> I suspect the Cox DHCP server is expecting a username and password from
> dhclient.conf
>
> I googled and the closest answer I found was a short article in the FreeBSD
> Diary published in 2000 that gave this as an example dhclient.conf:
>
> interface "de0" {
> send host-name "cr123456-a";
> request subnet-mask, broadcast-address, routers, domain-name-servers,
> domain-name, time-servers;
> require domain-name-servers;
> }
>
> I tried substituting my own interface and looked up the hostname info cox
> provided to my Windows 98 box and swapped the computer names, but no luck.
>
> Is my hunch correct?  When I set up my Windows boxes to connect to Cox with
> their CD, it always asked for the main account username and password – so
> I’m guessing when the dhcp client sends out its request for an address, the
> Cox DHCP server is expecting a username and password.
>
> Can anyone tell me how to send the username and password?
>
> TIA,
>
> Jim C.

Jim,

Many cable providers require that you register the MAC address of the NIC 
interfaces you connect to their cable modems.  Many used to do this, and have 
gotten away from it, as it causes problems such that you're experiencing now.  
When you had your service installed, did the service just work, or did you 
have to go to a web page and type some things in, first?  

I know that if you use an internet gateway device, such as a Linksys model, 
they usually have a feature called MAC Address Cloning to defeat this.  

To confirm this is your issue, try swapping network cards between the 
computers.  You should find that you're now able to obtain an IP address.

HTH
-- 
Eric F Crist

Keep your pecker hard and your powder dry, and the world WILL turn.