Getting Your Device Online
The main wireless network on our campus is the eduroam wireless network. Devices such as laptops, desktop computers, tablets, and smartphones should be connected to the eduroam network.
However many devices such as Game consoles, smart TVs, ebook readers, and media playing devices lack support for the stronger wireless security standards required by the eduroam network. Instead these devices can be connected to a special wireless network to support these more limited devices called the NP Hawks Devices wireless network. Follow the instructions in this article to get these types of devices onto the campus network and thus onto the Internet.
For our guide on what types of home devices work well and how to use devices such as Apple TVs and wireless printers from your phone please see: NP Hawks Devices - Shared and Unsupported Devices
Registering Your Device
In order to connect a device to the NP Hawks Devices you must register the device using it's MAC address and obtain a Wi-Fi password to use on the device.
Step 1. Find your device's wireless MAC Address
Every device that supports Wi-Fi (or wireless networking) has a unique identifier called a "MAC address" for it's wireless interface. This information must be provided when registering the device. MAC addresses consist of 12 characters which can be numbers or the letters A through F. MAC addresses are sometimes broken up by spaces, dashes, colons and other characters. Only the number and letters matter. Every letter and number is important so make sure to copy it accurately
Each device type exposes it's MAC address differently. Search your favorite search engine for the name of the device and a phrase such as "find wireless mac address". As an example "Roku find wireless mac address". Also this wikiHow article may be helpful: wikiHow: How to Find the MAC Address of Your Computer
You must use the wireless MAC address. If your device supports both wired and wireless Internet make sure to use the wireless MAC address and not the wired one.
Step 2. Register your device to obtain your Wi-Fi Password
Register your device by using this website: https://access.newpaltz.edu/guest/mac_list.php
Sign in with your New Paltz email address and password. The access.newpaltz.edu website is not accessible from offcampus. You can access the website while using another device connected to campus network, use the NP Hawks Guest wireless network, or use the campus VPN while offcampus. You can also stop by the Service Desk in HUM 103 if you are having problems accessing the site.
After logging into access.newpaltz.edu website click the link or button for Create Device or Create New Device. For Device Name pick any name you want to help you remember what this new device is. In the MAC Address box enter the wireless MAC address of the device you are registering. Enter just the numbers and the letters leaving out any other characters. When finished click the Create Device button.
You should now see a FINISHED CREATING DEVICE screen. The Device Details box will show the new Wi-Fi password to be used with this newly registered device. You can write it down now or come back to the access.newpaltz.edu website later to look it up again.
Your device will be registered for one year. Once one year has passed you will need to re-register the device and obtain a new Wi-Fi password.
Step 3. Connecting Your Device To NP Hawks Devices
In the Internet or Wireless settings portion of your device's user interface find the list of available nearby wireless networks and connect to the NP Hawks Devices network. When prompted for a password or pre-shared key (PSK) use the Wi-Fi password provided to you by the registration process. Your device should now be connected to the NP Hawks Devices wireless network and the Internet.
Common Problems
The following are common problems you may encounter:
1. You provided an incorrect MAC address while registering your device. Recheck that the obtained MAC address is the wireless and not the wired/ethernet MAC address. Make sure you haven't misread or mistyped your MAC address and modify your device's registration on the access.newpaltz.edu website.
2. You are using the wrong Wi-Fi password. The provided Wi-Fi password will only work with the MAC address provided and will not work with any other device or MAC address.
3. You have misentered the Wi-Fi password. The provided Wi-Fi password is case sensitive. This means that upper case letters and lower case letters are different and case should be preserved while entering the password. Also your password may contain spaces between numbers and letters and these spaces are important and must be entered.
4. Your device isn't connecting because it has MAC address randomization technology enabled:
For our system your MAC address acts like a username. Any device that attempts to randomize what MAC address it uses will create problems. Whenever possible ask the device to use it's real MAC address and not a random/private MAC address. To avoid this issue you can use these devices on the eduroam network instead which isn't affected.
On newer Android devices: Make sure "Use device MAC" or "Use Phone/Device MAC" is ON for the NP Hawks Devices network. The following third party guides may be of help:
On iOS 14 and later (iPhone/iPad devices): Make sure "Use Private Address" is turned OFF in the Wi-Fi settings for the NP Hawks Devices network.
5. Use automatic addresses/DHCP: Your device should be configured to use DHCP or automatically obtain all IP address, DNS, and general network information. Do not have any static IP addresses set.
Managing Your Registered Devices
If you need to see your Wi-Fi password again, change device details, or remove a registered device you may do so on this website: https://access.newpaltz.edu/guest/mac_list.php
On the access.newpaltz.edu website click Manage Devices. At the bottom of the page you will see a list of registered devices. Click the device you wish to view or make changes to and options for Remove, Edit, and Print will appear.
Remove: To delete a device registration click Remove. Make sure Delete account is checked and click Make Changes. Your device will be deleted. (Note: This screen treats the device registration as an "account". The account it is deleting is the registration of a specific device and not any other form of account.)
Edit: View the device's Wi-Fi password, correct the MAC address, and change the Device Name
Print: View the device's Wi-Fi password