Hardware Multiple consoles occupying same IP address

[NekoMichi]

Currently I have a N3DS and a N3DS XL, both of them have been configured to connect to the same router and both have the same Wi-Fi device name (but not MAC, of course). I have only ever connected one of the two to Wi-Fi at any given moment and never left both turned on at the same time, and it appears that both consoles use the same internal IP address on the wireless network.

Internet functions work just fine on both devices, as do networked homebrew functions such as video mirroring. I was just wondering if this is normal, and if there are any risks of this or not?

 

[Docmudkipz]

DHCP IP assignment being weird is the only thing I could think of, if you're really feeling worried about it just reserve two different IPs for the consoles. Shouldn't be any problem for the most part

 

[Pippin666]

Worse case scenario, your router will hang.

Pip'

 

[Ryccardo]

Yep, if you never actually tried them at the same time, your dhcp server probaby doesn't have pseudo-static addresses and just selects the lowest unused number!

 

[Cyan]

This is totally normal.

If you use DHCP, your router provides an IP from an available IP range (set the range from your router settings). For example from 192.168.1.10 to 192.168.1.15, allowing you to connect 6 devices at the same time.
Each time, it assigns the first available IP to the newly connected device.
if you connect both 3DS at the same time, they will have different IPs. if you connect them at different times, it will re-assign the free'd IP to the next online device.

If you use manual Fixed IP, you can also set the same IP to multiple devices, but you can't use them at the same time.