[Ti] Panther FireWire debacle

[Jean CLEMENT]

> I've been running Panther on a test machine for a while now. According
> to press, the problem seems limited to firewire 800. There are new
> drivers available today from LaCie and WiebeTech for their firewire 800
> equipment. I have an external LaCie firewire 400 drive (L2/200), and
> it's fine.

According to some other source (MacWay) this problem has been uncounter with
all brands of FireWire Hard Drives

This is a complete traduction of the warning email sent by Macway. Please
excuse the approximate english...

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We have the regret to inform you that Mac OS 10.3 ("Panther") could make
datas disappear from Firewire hard drives in some occasions; drive is not
recognized and asks for initialization.

This bug from Panther has an effect on all types and brands of FireWire Hard
drives.
 
Following are different cases identified till now:
 
- During the installation of Panther with a FireWire Hard Drive plug in at
the time.
 
- During a reboot with a FireWire Hard Drive plug in.
 
Those are our recommandations:
 
 - Never install Panther when a FireWire Hard Drive is pluged in. Unplug
physically all FireWire Hard Drives prior any installation of Panther.

 - Never reboot, boot or switch off you computer when a FireWire Hard Drive
is plugged. You should only plug in or plug again a FireWire Hard Drive when
the Desktop of the Finder has appeared. Think about ejecting and unplugging
your FireWire Hard Drives physically before any restart or switching off.

Apple is working to find a solution.

If your Hard Drive has been hit by this bug, and that it asks to be
initialized, follow this process:

 - Click on "ignore", do not initialize the Drive (we french are quite
judicious sometimes :o). All datas are still there, Panther has "just"
destroyed all informations for partitionning.

 - Try to plug in the FireWire Hard Drive on a machine running under Mac OS
9 and/or under Mac OS 10.2.x. Sometimes the FireWire Hard Drive is showing.
If it is the case backup your files then use the utility like disk/SOS disk
for a reparation.

 - Or try to start from the installation CD from Panther with the FireWire
Hard Drive plug in, open the Disk utility. If the FireWire Hard Drive is
seen then launch a reparation.
 
 - Do not try to use a program for "Disk Recover" as they are all
ineffective.

Wait for more informations to come these next days.