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Strange Dell PowerConnect MAC address appearing on network
I've got two older Dell PowerConnect 5324 switches on my residential network. The one in the theater room is the main LAN switch connected to the gateway (a Ubiquiti USG) and has a MAC address of 00:19:b9:xx:xx:57. The one in the kids playroom has a MAC address of 00:15:c5:xx:xx:bf. Port #2 of the theater switch is connected to port 1 of the playroom switch. Both switches have valid IPs on the internal network that I can see in the Ubiquiti management software (UniFi Controller).
My problem is that I also an additional MAC addresses on the network in the UniFi Controller. It's almost identical to the theater switch, except it ends in 6f (00:19:b9:xx:xx:6f). That's far too close to be a coincidence, but I've looked through as many settings via the switch's CLI and web UI and can find nothing to explain what it is. If I do:
show arp mac-address 00:19:b9:xx:xx:6f
I get nothing. If I do the following on either PowerConnect switch:
show bridge address-table
The :6f MAC address appears on neither one.
There's no IP address associated with this phantom MAC, it just shows up in the "Wired Clients" section of my controller software. There's very little activity for the MAC. Here are the only two info boxes in my controller software that tell me anything about that MAC:
The last time the MAC did anything on the network to be "noticed" by the controller software was over 10 days ago. It seems to only upload and never download.
Any ideas about what it might be or tips on what else to do to find out? Thanks in advance.
Anonymous
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March 21st, 2018 07:00
The switch itself is going to have numerous MAC addresses, these MAC addresses are used for identifying the different physical ports and in some case different MAC addresses are used by different features.
There was another community member that was trying to map out unknown MAC addresses, here is their solution: http://dell.to/2HSrphO
The same process should work for this model of switch. What is your end goal with identifying this switch MAC address?
Steve Jenkins
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March 21st, 2018 13:00
Thanks, Daniel. That's a very helpful link. After reading it, I've determined that since 6F minus 57 in HEX is 24, it's port 24 that's responsible for that MAC address. That's the switch port connected to the gateway's WAN interface, which explains why the gateway's management software "sees" that MAC address on the network, even though there's no LAN IP assigned to it.
My end goals for identifying this switch MAC address are two fold:
Thanks again for the nudge in the right direction. Although I'm still confused as to why the port's MAC address is being seen the way it is in the UniFi Controller... but that's a perfect question for me to go ask in the UniFi forums. :)
Anonymous
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March 21st, 2018 13:00
Thanks for the update, really glad to hear that info helped you out.