PB G4 15" Using FW direct won't clone to ext FW drive using iMac CRT (G3)

Question

Info:
PB G4 15" 1.5, 512 mb ram, original 80gig internal HD having sleep issues (meainging it will go into sleep mode whenever it wants and will not stay "awake")
iMac CRT G3 as stable platform, still running strong after 6 years :^) !!
Both are still running (ugh, I know) 10.3.9
I recently purchased an IBM/Hitachi Deskstar 3.5" 80 gig HD and an no-name-brand 3rd party ext. FW/USB 2.0 drive enclosure to (hopefully) clone the G4 15" PB and wipe out it's drive and start from scratch to see if it's a OS issue rather than a hardware issue causing my sleep issues.
I originally partitioned the PB 15" HD to have 3 partitions and the cloning process SEEMED ok on the non opertating system partions, but carbon copy cloner is having problems with any folder larger than 4 gigs, e.g., a VPC drive image doesn't clone properly, CCC only cloned 1 gig whereas my VPC image is about 6 gigs, also, my applications folder, which is approximately 5 gigs on the PB G4 15", hangs when CCC tries to clone it to the Ext HD drive.
Did I shoot myself in the foot by buying a non-name-brand Ext Hd FW/USB enclosure? Are there jumper settings on the Ext HD that I should pay attention to? I currently have the Deskstar HD set to "Primary," Disk Utility partitions the ext HD ok and First Aid results in no ploblems. Is my iMac DV 500mhz too slow to keep up with the cloning process? I only have 256mb ram/original 20gig HD.
I've heard/read that 10.3.6 and up causes problems with ext HD FW/USB enclosures.
Any help would be greatfully appreciated!!
Greg
PB G4 15" 1.5 Mac OS X (10.3.9) iMac, Pismo, PB 1400cs, Apple ][+

Answer 1

Hi, mattn.
Here's a better idea. Erase the external drive. Clone your brother's internal hard drive to it as a backup. Test to see whether the Powerbook will boot normally to the clone. If it doesn't, stop right there and run a full battery of first aid and repair utilities on the internal drive, then clone it again and test again. If all tests on the internal drive are OK, your external drive enclosure(s) may just not be bootable — some aren't.
If the clone on the external drive boots the PB with no problems, upgrade the internal drive to Tiger so your brother can put it through its paces for a couple of weeks. If he likes it and decides to keep it installed, clone the internal drive again to the external drive, so Tiger and any work done in the interim is backed up. If he wants to stick with whatever older OS he was using, erase the internal drive and clone the external drive back to it. In the latter case, be sure to make a separate backup of any documents that have been created or modified during his trial period, before restoring the older clone to the internal drive.
Note that a Powerbook with Firewire 800 is Aluminum, not Titanium, and there's a separate set of forums for the Albooks:
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=135
Any future questions related to the Powerbook's hardware should be directed there to reach the folks who are most knowledgeable about those models.