MAC

1. Short for Medium Access Control, a MAC address also known as a physical address is a unique address number formatted in hexadecimal format and given to each computer and/or network device on a computer network. Below is an example of a MAC address:
   
   A1:B2:C3:D4:E5:F6
   
   Because a MAC address is a unique address, a computer network will not have the same MAC address assigned to more than one computer or network device.
   
   Users who are running Microsoft Windows who are interested in learning their MAC address or another computer's MAC address can use the nbstat or ipconfig command. Additional information about these command can be found on our nbtstat command page and ipconfig command page.
   
   If you're running Linux / Unix or a variant, you can determine the MAC Address or hardware address using the ifconfig command. Additional information about this command can be found on our ifconfig command page.
   
   
2. Short for Apple Macintosh, see our Macintosh definition for additional information about this term.

Also see: Hexadecimal, Hostid, Network definitions, Physical address