I’m aware that the mac address is part of the data link layer, but why can’t I just use my MAC address as IP address, too?
Why do I need both addresses?
In: 14
Mostly because the IP address is structured, so it contains information about which network you’re on. That makes routing possible.
Imagine if we just used MAC addresses. When you visit reddit, their server knows “we need to send a response to this MAC address”
How do the routers along the way know where that is? Do they store a list of *every* MAC address on the internet in their routing tables?
With IP addresses they can just store ranges. “Anything from this IP to that IP are owned by this company, and so should be routed in that direction”, or even “anything in this range is somewhere over in Asia. Let’s send the response in *that* direction first, and let someone else deal with the fine-grained stuff”
With MAC addresses you wouldn’t be able to do that. You’d have to know where every single MAC address is located.
Latest Answers