Due to apparent disk problems, I now have a usb2 + firewire external
disk enclosure. I tried it with firewire first, and it seemed to work ok
for mounting (read-only) and some directory listings.
Then I tried a large recursive diff; it reported an I/O error in some
file. When I went to look in that file, the disk (or at least the data
stream from the disk) stalled. Leaving it for a while made no change. 
As a desperate measure I yanked the firewire cable. I should not have
done that since it froze the entire system immediately (just like it
does with usb).

I remember from a while ago that it was known that firewire mass storage
doesn't work that well, but since I didn't have any equipment I didn't
track that. Is it known in some fashion what the problem is? Is there
anything I can do (not knowing anything about the firewire protocol or
such things) to help?

(the usb connection seems to work better, so far)

-Olaf.
-- 
___ Olaf 'Rhialto' Seibert      -- You author it, and I'll reader it.
\X/ rhialto/at/xs4all.nl        -- Cetero censeo "authored" delendum esse.