[Pioner]

Hi,
I have a Netgear R9000 (my third Netgear router with DD-WRT) and I set the "MAC Clone" = "Enable" in Setup - MAC Address Clone, and the WAN MAC value was specified (various).
As a result the internet indicator is off and DHCP-address from the ISP is not assigned (0.0.0.0).
Rebooting and re-switching cable and waiting for an hour does not help.
This error is observed in all DD-WRT versions for R9000.
Although in stock Netgear-firmware it worked well.

[ddaniel51]

Did you try removing power from your internet modem for a few seconds and rebooting? Some cable modems will not recognize a new MAC unless they are cold booted.

[Pioner]

Yes, I waited many times from a few seconds to a few hours, with the power turned on and off.
But, I have a directly cable connection from ISP, without a modem.
WAN MACs that used to work in other routers were also checked.
I know perfectly well how this option works, and I used it for many years, DD-WRT for Netgear WNDR3800 and R7800 have no such problem, and in stock firmware is also Ok.
So it seems to be a problem in DD-WRT or incompatibility with R9000.

[Pioner]

If I set "Clone WAN MAC" = router's own MAC, the DHCP-address is released and the internet starts working. But if "Clone WAN MAC" differs by at least 1 character from the physical MAC, then there is a problem.

[Pioner]

I checked the connection in "MAC Address Clone" mode with another ISP, it did not work also.
Therefore it's not a ISP problem.
I tried to connect R9000 (as a client) to my old R7800 router (as a DHCP-server) via the WAN-port, as a result the R7800 router assigns a new IP for R9000, the cloned MAC-address of R9000 blinks in the Active Clients list, but then the connection breaks immediately, and it is looped.
How can I see in more detail what happens at the fail moment?
How to report a bug to firmware developers?

[Per Yngve Berg]

Have you checked the Interface status with "ifconfig"?

[Pioner]

ifconfig:

[Per Yngve Berg]

Have you tried a Kong Build?

http://www.desipro.de/ddwrt/K4-AC-ALPINE/

[Pioner]

Yes, without success.
I have tried a Kong Build, and Voxel's Custom R9000 NETGEAR Firmware, and all betas since 2017.
All DD-WRT for Netgear R9000 has this problem.
At the same time the stock firmware does not have this problem, and there is no this problem in DD-WRT for other Netgear models.

[Per Yngve Berg]

Most likely a Ethernet Driver issue.

The WAN port is on the Alpine Chip, while the LAN ports is the Atheros switch.

https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Netgear_R9000

No other router model have this hardware.

You can test with one of the LAN ports a WAN.

[p1nky]

Sorry for digging up this old thread but I just came across the same issue and I wonder if there is any fix for it in the meantime?

I am running Firmware: DD-WRT v3.0-r44715 std (11/03/20)
Update: it's the same with the latest Firmware: DD-WRT v3.0-r45454 std (01/15/21)

My ISP assigns the IP address depending on the router's MAC address and I'd like to keep the old IP address.

To add bit of current and additional information to the old post: when I clone the MAC address then it seems that the cable modem actually "sees" the cloned MAC because I do get exactly the same IP address assigned that I expected with the cloned MAC address (it shows up in "WAN IP" and also in Status/WAN).

However, I can't access the internet with any client and also the R9000 itself apparently cannot connect to the internet, at least I can see in the DDNS tab status log that it can't resolve the name of the DDNS provider ("INADYN:IP: Error '0x16' resolving host name 'freedns.afraid.org'" - and it's not just a DNS problem as I have set the google static DNS IPs for one Windows client and with that I also don't have any luck).

As soon as I disabled MAC address cloning internet access was fine again (with a changed IP address however due to my ISP).

[ktuimala]

I too am wondering if anyone has had success in using the "MAC Address Clone" feature on an R9000. I am in a situation where I am stuck with a public IP address from Spectrum that is black listed. There support is useless. I have tried keeping my equipment powered down when the lease expires and I still get the same black listed IP address. So was excited to see this feature. Unfortunately, it doesn't allow any clients to connect to the internet at all. However, I do get a new IP address, but it just isn't useable.

I have flashed to the r47581 (10/2/2021). As stated, I get a new IP address according to the WAN status page, but nothing can connect to the internet at all. Even ping from CLI on the router fails to reach google.

I did note that I get a VLAN2 entry when cloning is enabled when I run ifconfig. Normally there is only a VLAN1 entry with cloning disabled. The defaults has WAN setup as VLAN2. Also I noted that there is a bridge setup between eth0 and VLAN1.

Anyway, if anyone has solved this for the Netgear R9000, please let me know. Also if you want anymore information, please let me know and I will get it for you.

[ktuimala]

So... Funny how posting a question or asking for help suddenly helps you yield the answer? Well, that just happened to me with my R9000 and cloning my mac address. So, for the sake of anyone else stumbling on this thread, here is how I solved it.

First off, on my R9000, as I assume will be the same with other R9000s, I ssh'ed in and ran ifconfig to find the eth0, eth2, and vlan2 all share the same mac address. When using the "Mac Address Clone" option, only vlan2 gets updated with the the new mac address, which puts it out of sync with eth0 and eth2, hence the no internet access issue. So, I wrote a startup script to change the mac address of eth0, eth2, and vlan2. After restarting my modem I finally had a new IP address and working internet.

To implement this, simply go to Administration -> Commands and create the following startup script.

A note of warning, run the script first to make sure your router is still accessible. Make sure to verify with ifconfig via ssh. If so, then set it as the startup script. Otherwise you will have to reflash your router via tftp using the reset switch. (I bricked mine a few times today before discovering this solution.)

Obviously, replace <original_mac_address> with your original mac address as a reminder and <new_mac_address> with the new mac address.

Make sure you are using a legitimate mac address. I stole mine from a dead piece of equipment in my house.

[Alozaros]

I've also found R9000 has a strange MAC behaviour
what is the output of this command:

nvram show | grep hwaddr


if your commands are in start up script, no need of nvram commit command there, as in start up script they will survive reboot, so on reboot it will change this mac to whatever you selected...on every start up...

for more info you can have a look at this tread...
https://forum.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=330392&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15

i ended up manually changing each mac address i want to change...and yep bear in mind this is fragile business...must be very careful...

i first flashed with Kong build if this makes any sense...i couldn't flash with BS via TFTP...just couldn't get the right timing i guess...or the factory build was a bit bigger...47510

[ktuimala]

Ah... I did not know the startup script changes would make the nvram set commands moot. Good to know. Originally I noted that my changing of the mac didn't reflect in the GUI, so I did that as a measure to insure I didn't confuse myself in the future. My R9000 does a lot for me and I have configs and scripts doing all sorts of things.

Anyway, as requested, here is the output you requested. I still have my override in there. Ended up changing the mac to a virtual nic from an ESXi VM I was going to delete.