Why Would an Arp Frame have a Destination Mac Address of 00:00:00:00:00:00??

Posted in  mac | 2022-03-18

Lab 12: TCP/IP Protocols

Why would an ARP frame have a destination MAC address of 00:00:00:00:00:00? In the initial ARP request the IP address is known but the MAC address is not so the MAC address is all zeros. What type of packet is an ARP reply?

Why do First ARP Request Packets Normally have 00 00 00 00 00 00 as a Target Physical Address?

And it target mac address is the UNKNOW 00:00:00:00:00. This is called "ARP Cache Validation" packet means ARP timeout has expired and switch wants to try the validation the same "is this ARP validate with the same IP".

What Would be the Destination MAC Address of an ARP Frame?

The Ethernet header has the same three parts: a Destination MAC address, a Source MAC address, and an EtherType. The Destination MAC is Host A — the initial requester, and the Source MAC is Host B — the original target. Notice the frame is addressed directly back to Host A – this is what makes the response unicast.

Why is the Destination MAC Address FF FF FF FF FF FF Used Sometimes?

Limited broadcast IPv4 address is 255.255. Once the Ethernet frame reaches the network switch, if the destination MAC address is broadcast MAC address ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff, the network switch will forward the Ethernet frame to all its active ports, so that all the devices in the broadcast domain will receive a copy.

What does the Destination MAC Address Signify?

When it comes to transferring data from one device to another, then destination MAC-address field has the value of the recipient – that is, the address which we have discussed above. In this case, destination MAC-address is a unicast (unicast) MAC-address.