I feel pretty sad about having to post this here because technically the drive is working almost flawlessly – via USB 2.0 at least. I’m a Motion Media Design BFA student who works only in MacOSX Snow Leopard but between an iMac, a MacbookPro and finally-- an Axiotron Modbook when I need to do drawing/illustration work. My Passport Studio drive (WDBAAE6400ASL) was purchased just this May.
Only within the past month have I started using the drive with the Modbook, and only because I was working with *very* large .psd files that would not fit all at once on the Modbook’s hard drive – so I never bothered trying to hook it up via 400-to-800 firewire, just used the other cable to read it via USB 2.0. I would copy the files one at a time to the Modbook’s harddrive before editing them, too, then move them back – never edited them ON the drive through the USB2 connection.
Within the past week though, the drive has stopped being read whatsoever by the firewire800 cable. I can only read it on my iMac or MacbookPro via USB, which is awful since I relied on the firewire to do on-the-drive video editing. It’s impossible to do what I was doing via a USB 2.0 connection, much less the lack of USB ports on iMacs / MacbookPros to begin with.
Short and sweet – any programming/ software reason the drive would stop recognizing the firewire in favor of *only* USB 2.0? Was there any warning I missed telling me to use it only one way primarily? My next, but last step, was going to be replacing the firewire cable to see if that’s the problem. If it isn’t though, I need to return the drive. I *need* firewire for my classes/ career work 
