How to connect the Internet without a router to a laptop and prefix TV Box? One cable

Question

How to connect a laptop and TV Box with one cable without a router. The cable is configured by the provider on the laptop. If I switch the cable to the set-top box, there is no internet. You advise to contact the provider to change the settings on the set-top box, but will the laptop work if you reconnect it after setting the set-top box. I asked this question in a search, but the site didn’t find anything.

Answer

Honestly, I don’t remember what and where I advised on this problem. I mean about changing the settings from the provider to the TV Box.

Look, it depends on the ISP. If they use MAC address binding (and Dynamic IP connection type), then the internet can only work on the device to which the internet is bound. If you write the MAC-address of your TV box to your ISP, then after you connect the cable back to your laptop, the Internet will not work on it. If there is no MAC-address binding, the Internet should work immediately on the device to which the cable is connected.

There is one solution. It is hardly possible to change the MAC-address on the set-top box. But you can change it on your laptop. You need to set the same MAC address on the laptop as on the set-top box. It can be found in the set-top box settings, somewhere in the “About device” section. I wrote about how to change it on the laptop in the article How to find out and change MAC address in Windows 10. After that, this MAC-address (which will be the same on the laptop and TV Box) should be assigned by the provider. Internet should work through one cable on both devices.

But this is not a good solution. It is better, of course, to buy a Wi-Fi router. This will solve all the problems.

Note that your ISP may not have MAC-address binding (you didn’t write about it), but there may be a connection via high-speed connection, which can be set up on your laptop without problems, but most likely not on your TV set-top box.

Or another solution. If your set-top box has wi-fi, you can try to distribute Internet via Wi-Fi from your laptop. And connect the Smart set-top box to this Wi-Fi network.