Firewire failures

Been using firewire for a few years now, but just come across a problem I've not seen before.
I connect a G4 to another Mac (any model) start it as a firewire drive the icon appears on the other mac's desktop,
Then when I try to access to the target drive takes I get the spinning "wait" icon for in excess of an hour.
Tried this with 3 different G4s connecting to a G4 of the same model, an iMac and an iBook still the same error.
I've looked for firewire updates / drivers etc. to no avail - any ideas ??

Will the FW port in question work with other devices (i.e., an iPod, camera, external drive)?
iSMH

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    "Mike Mihalik, LaCie
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    LaCie's Mike Mihalik checked in with some tips about dealing with FireWire failures:
    Seems like the FireWire issue needs to be revisited quite often. Here is my often repeated suggestion which appears to clear up many FireWire issues: reset the FireWire ports. Panther has a Finder Preference to show mounted volumes on the Desktop. You must set this for mounted drives to be visible. Please follow these instructions to reset your FireWire port. Here is a summary:
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    Seems like the FireWire issue needs to be revisited quite often. Here is my often repeated suggestion which appears to clear up many FireWire issues: reset the FireWire ports. Panther has a Finder Preference to show mounted volumes on the Desktop. You must set this for mounted drives to be visible. Please follow these instructions to reset your FireWire port. Here is a summary:
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    What to do if your computer won't recognize a FireWire or USB device
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    LaCie's Mike Mihalik checked in with some tips about dealing with FireWire failures:
    Seems like the FireWire issue needs to be revisited quite often. Here is my often repeated suggestion which appears to clear up many FireWire issues: reset the FireWire ports. Panther has a Finder Preference to show mounted volumes on the Desktop. You must set this for mounted drives to be visible. Please follow these instructions to reset your FireWire port. Here is a summary:
    1. shut down and disconnect all external drives and peripherals ; make sure nothing is connected to the FireWire ports.
    2. use Apple Disk Utility to repair permissions on your internal boot drive.
    3. shut down and disconnect the AC power from the computer as well as the drives; if laptop, also remove battery; let sit unpowered and unconnected for 15 minutes.
    4. reconnect AC power to only the computer (battery too if laptop)
    restart computer.
    5. verify that FireWire ports are visible within Apple System Profiler.
    6. reconnect FireWire drive (only one); refresh window within Apple System Profiler to rescan the FireWire bus; confirm that drive is visible.
    7. confirm drive is OK by using Apple Disk Utility and apply First Aid
    repeat for other drives, one at a time.
    What to do if your computer won't recognize a FireWire or USB device;
    FireWire Issues- Drives disappearing or unmountable - corrupt volumes - solutions.

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