[rozwado1]

So I was using my Mac mini as usual and I left for work, unplugging my iPod after unmounting from iTunes. A few hours later I come home to find that my FW hard drive doesn't mount, my iPod won't mount, and my external CD burner can't be recognized by OS X. All peripherals get power, but none can transfer data. In system profiler, under hardware>firewire it just says "FireWire Bus:" - no other data. I remember on my iBook that it had other stuff like "400MB/s". I have nothing.

I tried running Diskwarrior, Disk Utility, holding option at startup to boot from firewire, but nothing works. It can't recognize the devices.

Luckily I'm 2 blocks from an Apple Specialist and still under warranty (1 month old), but I'm curious to find out what the hell happened?

Anybody else have a problem like this?

[redhot_nyc]

boot into safe mode
command-s at startup
does it say anything about firewire right before the command line shows up?
if so then your firewire port is burnt out

firewire ports can burn out if you twist the cable, or use old firewire cables

[Big Mac]

Before you jump to any hardware conclusions, you probably will want to reinstall the OS.

[rozwado1]

Unplugged the Mac for a half hour and retried. Works now, but I'm weary as to what caused it.

Found an article here.

[tooki]

Sometimes a PMU reset is all it takes.

My hunch is that the protection circuitry that Apple added to later models' FireWire ports can "trip" like a circuit breaker, and needs downtime to reset.

tooki

[chipchen]

if it is a hardware issue... I would discontinue use of that iPod firewire cable. It's possible that if the firewire cable insulation is damaged, and the wires crossed, it took your fw port out of commission.

but yet, eliminate all software possibilities first. if your fw drive is bootable, boot holding down the option key to get to the multiboot screen. if it is a bootable drive and doesn't even show up, you've got a hardware issue. try resetting the PMU, reset PRAM, etc.

good luck.