After moving, cannot connect to my second linuxcnc mesa 7i96s

I am really struggling to figure out what the issue is here and am looking for some help. Prior to moving states, I set up linuxcnc with my mill and it was working fine, I then purchased a lathe and another mesa board (both are 7i96s) and attempted to set it up and I was unable to do so, it took a lot of debugging with AI but eventually I found a way for both boards to work even though both were set at 10.10.10.10. However, now after moving, I have set everything back up, and my mill board does not communicate with my computer at all and I don't remember how to solve the issue. Here is what I know so far:

1. Originally, both boards were using EEPROM jumpers and 10.10.10.10 (and my HAL files reflect those IP addresses)
2. The default IP address has never worked for me for either board
3. Currently, my lathe board works correctly, when I plug it into my computer everything connects up right away and works as expected, it is also the last board I used prior to the move (meaning my lathe was the last machine I was using)
4. I am unable to ping the mill board, mesa flash does not recognize any 7i96s connected when the mill is plugged in, because of this, I cant change the IP address
5. the LED lights / sequences are identical in both boards on powering up
6. I tried upgrading linuxcnc and updating my packages and that did not help
7. IF I unplug all of the ports on my lathe board and move it over to my mill, the mill does work and linuxcnc connects


It feels like there is an IP address conflict or something else going on where it's expecting the lathe board because that's what was last used. I recall having this exact same issue when I first purchased the lathe but for the life of me I cant remember how I actually fixed it. I do not think the actual mesa board is broken in any way.

Does anyone have any big picture suggestions on what I can do for further debugging in terminal?

Are you using seperate NIC's for each Mesa board?

I am using a single ethernet port on my computer where only one board is attached at any one given time (so I unplug one board and replug the second board)