bendsley

Ok, the switches are caching your MAC address for easy routing. Chances are that if they are connecting back to a fiber backbone, they are layer 3 switches which help in routing, so by keeping your ip address attached to your MAC address, it's easier on the network.

Also, since you're inside the university, it's highly unlikely that you are getting a world routable IP address and you are probably pulling something like 10.10.x.x or 192.168.x.x, etc. If you are, that's not actually your IP address to the outside world. Your IP to the outside world would be whatever address is assigned to the border router at your university. You might try going to www.whatismyip.com and see what the website shows as your IP address. Then do a start --> run --> type "cmd" --> hit ok --> type "ipconfig". See if what the website shows and what ipconfig shows differ. If they do, the website you are trying to get to is blocking the University's IP address and really no matter what IP you get internally at the University, you still would not have access to that website because the router will translate your internal address to your external address all the time.

If you are pulling a world routable IP address, then there really isn't a lot you can do without accessing the DHCP servers to release your MAC address and let you pull another.

I highly doubt you will have a world routable IP address. Because, the university is easily able to shutdown your network port should you be in non-compliance with University policy (ie. peer-to-peer), and they can better protect you from computer breakins (hacking (pc term. here)).

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