Oscillating MAC addresses

[AndyCountry]

Hi all (esp Patio).

HP Pavilion g6 lappy
Win8 (not 8.1) 6.2.9200 Build 9200 x64
AMD A4 -4300M 2.4ghz
BIOS Insyde F.17
SMBIOS Ver 2.7
Embedded Controller Ver 57.80
4GB RAM

Device Manager is clean. However, under Network Adapters, "Microsoft Kernel Debug Adapter" is running (is that advisable?)

BACKGROUND: A friend lost wifi connectivity at her home. I reset the cable modem and router which fixed it (her router isn't set for MAC filtering). Brought the machine to my place to look into why it was running slower than molasses in Winter. MSE and Malwarebytes were clean.


PROBLEM: I use MAC addy filtering on my home router. Ipconfig /all gave me the Wifi MAC addy but after configuring my router, the box wouldn't connect. A few minutes later, I re-check the MAC addy with ipconfig /all but the last digit had changed. Turns out, every few minutes, the MAC addy changes. It alternates between the same 2 addresses (not just random ones). And only the last digit changes each time.

Connects fine via network cable.

Thanks in advance!

[Geek-9pm]

Just a general observation.:
The MAC is part of the Network Interface hardware.
The specific device maybe be either an Ethernet device or a 802.11 wireless device. If the wireless device changed one digit, it suggests the hardware is defective. Also, software may emulate a MAC, but changing one digit  would not be an expected behavior.

A media access control address (MAC address) is a unique identifier assigned to network interfaces for communications on the physical network segment. MAC addresses are used as a network address for most IEEE 802 network technologies, including Ethernet. Logically, MAC addresses are used in the media access control protocol sublayer of the OSI reference model.

MAC addresses are most often assigned by the manufacturer of a network interface controller (NIC) and are stored in its hardware, such as the card's read-only memory or some other firmware mechanism. If assigned by the manufacturer, a MAC address usually encodes the manufacturer's registered identification number and may be referred to as the burned-in address (BIA). It may also be known as an Ethernet hardware address (EHA), hardware address or physical address. This can be contrasted to a programmed address, where the host device issues commands to the NIC to use an arbitrary address.
A network node may have multiple NICs and each NIC must have a unique MAC address.
MAC addresses are formed according to the rules of one of three numbering name spaces managed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE): MAC-48, EUI-48, and EUI-64.  ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAC_address
Recommendation. Get a lo-cost USB Wireless thing. Cost is less than lunch for two people here in USA.
Just trying to help. 

[AndyCountry]

Thanks for the reply!

I was very tired last night, when I was trying to understand why my router would not accept either wifi MAC addy. But today, with adequate sleep, I've noticed that there are 2 wifi adapters on the machine which match the 2 different MAC addys I was seeing last night using ipconfig /all.

One is the a Realtek wifi adapter (hardware). The other is a Microsoft Wi-Fi Direct Virtual Adapter. BOTH are wifi adapters, just to be clear.

If anyone has also experienced this problem, please post if you found a way to stop this phenomenon, so that I can use that info to lock-in the use of ONLY the hardware Wifi card, not the MSFT Virtual one. The MSFT Virtual Wifi looks like a hacker's dream to me.

Many thanks in advance.

[Geek-9pm]

Found this:
What is Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter

Currently this feature is a development platform that exists only for application developers. Since this is a development platform any support would need to go through the application developer.

Which means ... If you don't know what it is, you don't want it.
Remove it. (After setting a restore  point).

But read the MS article. They claim it is needed sometimes. And it goers on to a four page rant.

[BC_Programmer]

Found this:
What is Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter Which means ... If you don't know what it is, you don't want it.
Remove it. (After setting a restore  point).

But read the MS article. They claim it is needed sometimes. And it goers on to a four page rant.

"Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter"
"Microsoft Wi-Fi Direct Virtual Adapter"

These are not the same thing. The latter is for using a WLAN card on a PC with a wired connection to create an Access Point. I believe it will appear if a Wireless and wired adapter are used to create a network bridge.

[Geek-9pm]

Thanks BC for the correction.
Here are two references.

1.) "Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter" (four pages)
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-networking/what-is-microsoft-virtual-wifi-miniport-adapter/78a96f27-ae98-42e1-891d-e8651cd99748

2.) "Microsoft Wi-Fi Direct Virtual Adapter"
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-windows_store/what-is-the-purpose-of-the-microsoft-wi-fi-direct/77a9e249-651f-4061-b160-07c139cc4bb7

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-hardware/recieving-message-microsoft-wi-fi-direct-virtual/8b349aa7-f72c-411c-9509-8eb92f9cf1c1

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/downloads/994abd5f-53d1-4dba-a9d8-8ba1dcccead7/

http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Wireless-Internet-Home-Networking/Microsoft-Wi-Fi-Direct-Virtual-Adapter-Windows-8/td-p/3466369

The last is from HP and they shift it to MS.

[AndyCountry]

As it turns out, this Virtual Wi-Fi adapter comes installed on this HP Pavilion laptop. It's for the pseudo-hardware side of the MSFT "Play to" effort. I watched a MSFT presentation online where half the stuff they tried didn't work.

 I'm just glad that I managed get the problem fixed, and the thing will connect to the WiFi router now.

... and that <strike>Mr. Ballmer</strike>Uncle Fester is using is intellect to pay 400% over market price for an NBA team - instead of ruining MSFT.