I've noticed you've gone with a different numbering schema with the Mk2s.

With the Mk1s you guys just started up at 0001 and went up to 0350 something.

With the First batch of the Mk2s you started at 0600000001 and went up to 0600000070 something.

With this batch you are using 0800000001....08000xxxxx? Why the difference between the 0600 and the 0800 starting between the two batches of Mk?

Sorry, I'm just bored at work today. :)

(O|||||O)

With the First batch of the Mk2s you started at 0600000001 (..) this batch you are using 0800000001....08000xxxxx?

The first units shipped in June; we're now in August??
Just a wild guess . . .


Henno
mk2 nr 6

Silly boys. The numbers have to do with the drive size, don't they?

___________
Tony Fabris

The numbers have to do with the drive size, don't they?

That's what I thought when my 060000006 got delivered, but find it odd that they would code-in the drive capacity inside a serial number. It just doesn't make sense. Also, I can't think of a reason that makes it that important that it's included in the serial: much less important than e.g. hardware version.

But, AFAIK, there are no 8GB Mk2's; and it *is* August; and they have always been a bit secretive on speed of shipping!

By having the date (MMYY?) as the starting numbers of the serial, things would fit.
And it allows shipping 100,000 Mk2s each month! Gee, these guys are ambitious


Henno
mk2 6nr 6

By having the date (MMYY?) as the starting numbers of the serial, things would fit.

Hmm, you make a good point. Maybe that's it.

Only one thing. By going MMYY instead of YYMM, Rob would be screwing his ability to alphanumerically sort the serial numbers.

___________
Tony Fabris

maybe he just has a piece of code to take the first two as the month and the next two as the year?

it isn't drive size.

I have a 12Gb and i don't have either of those digits.

Murray 06000047
____________________

it isn't drive size. I have a 12Gb and i don't have either of those digits.

That's not what I meant. I meant coded, i.e., 6=some size, 7=some size, 8=some size... etc.

___________
Tony Fabris

It is MMYYxxxxx where xxxxx is the serial number, which is irrespective of month (ie, we don't go back to 1 each month).

We didn't pick the scheme, the manufacturers did. Seems fine to me :)

Hugo
(the MAC address is based on the serial number; take a look in drivers/net/smc9194_tifon.c to see how...)

Ah, well, then Henno gets the brownie pin. Do I get a consolation prize? No? Ah well. Can't blame me for trying.

Nifty trick that the serial number is in the mac address.

___________
Tony Fabris

Only half a pin though:
where xxxxx is the serial number, which is irrespective of month (ie, we don't go back to 1 each month).
So there not trying to hide the number of players shipped. Apologies Hugo/Rob/others at empeg

Nifty trick that the serial number is in the mac address.
A brownie pin for you when you explain mac address.

Henno
mk2 6 nr 6

Ok, not trying to get any more technical than needed (anyway I am no engineer so..) :

MAC address is something every network interface card has (atleast ethernet ones, I must admit I don't remember how the elder TokenRing etc. cards were named, they must have had something similar). It is the hardware level 'identifier' of the card and it is unique (there should not be two network interfaces with the same hardware address (MAC) though this has been known to happen sometimes), every manufacturer uses their own 'chunk' of MAC addresses.

They look like this: 00:10:5A:D6:F8:FD and are transmitted around in your network. The IP for instance is on an upper level, over the hardware level.. many protocols (for instance NetBeui for local Microsoft Networks) use the hardware level addresses, not the IP, unless made to work over IP. You can check your NIC's (network interface card, like 3Com likes to call them) MAC-address from Win9x machines by starting the "winipcfg" program.

ie. your Empeg also has a MAC address as it has an Ethernet connection.

At where I work for, we use the MAC addresses to distribute IP-numbers to all desktop machines from our Linux dhcp server so that we can dynamically allocate the IP to the end user. For instance, you bring your laptop with an ethernet jack here, we configure it to fetch the IP-address automagically (less configuring work for the admins, you get the DNS, gateway, netmask etcetc through the dhcp also) and it works anywhere in the house with the slight bonus that we can change our own network configuration without having to access your laptop - next time you plug in, the dhcpd sees your MAC-address crying for an IP configuration and it sends it one.

When Intel caused a great fuzz about Pentium III ID-tags (the fuzz was about privacy etc.), people sort of forgot that all their computers that have a 'network card' were already uniquely identified... but now that is a different matter :).


Antti 'Amarth' Luostarinen
#14229
try BatMUD - telnet bat.org ;)

MAC address is something every network interface (... etc)

Thanks Antti. Guess the brownie pin is yours now.

I think I understand your explanation. One of my problems is that:
1) I haven't played with computer networks since IBM launched (!) token ring (and that's a long time ago)
2) I don't like / can't remember akronyms (or, may be, don't want to remember them -- I once declined a job offer from IBM for that reason -- way before they (IBM) got into token ring )



Henno
mk2 6 nr 6

MAC stands for "Media Access Controller".

I'm not sure I agree with the idea of randomly generating a MAC address based on serial number. Any manufacturer using Ethernet is supposed to formally apply for an address block. Creating your own random number is as bad as just making up your own IP address.

One of the few remaining Mk1 owners... #00015

You actually get a 3-byte prefix from the IEEE (and it'll cost you $1200 - that's $50 per bit!). They won't give you another prefix until you've used at least 90% of the one you currently have.

Making up MAC addresses is generally fine, as they stay on the local network and there are 2^48 of them, which is quite a lot... you have to be careful though, as some of the early bytes (2nd byte, bit 0?) signifies things like multicast...

Hugo

I don't like / can't remember akronyms

Do you know what PCMCIA stands for?

"People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms"

tanstaafl.

"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"

The worst acronym abusers are the avation community and the military. At work, we combine the two. Its possible for people to speak several sentences and not use a full word I think :P

Do you know what PCMCIA stands for?

I think I'll be able (willing?) to remember that one

Henno
mk2 6 nr 6