Windows 7 Starter & MAC Spoofing

[bhanson]

Would anyone with Windows 7 Starter try changing the MAC address on their wireless card?

I'm having trouble changing the MAC address on my netbook running Windows 7 Starter. I've tried both the built in wireless (Atheros AR9285) and a USB dongle (WG111v2) and neither will work.

My desktop running Windows 7 Professional allows me to change the MAC address on the exact same USB dongle.

I've read that Atheros chips are not able to accommodate this, but the Netgear definitely can since it works on my desktop. I wouldn't think Windows 7 Starter would inhibit this but it very well could with the other networking limitations.

I've tried changing it in the hardware manager, registry, and some software available online and none of them actually take effect on the netbook.

If anyone has any data concerning MAC spoofing on Windows 7 Starter it would be much appreciated.

 

[bhanson]

(Updating for completeness and for future searches)

The issue is a software problem with newer network drivers.

For some reason there are some problems in Vista/7 with newer signed drivers and MAC address changing. Some drivers will still have the option to change it in the device manager but it doesn't take effect.

In my case I was able to get both network adapters working on my netbook by using older versions of the drivers. I don't like using outdated software but everything seems to be working fine.

 

[DRMPe]

I have exactly the same problem as you but I am no Geek Which version should I download? Mine is Atheros AR9285 version 8.0.0.238.

Thank you so much in advance.

 

[MtnMan]

So you can hack a wireless network that is using MAC filtering 🙄