On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 04:45:58 -0800, Jamie Zawinski <jwz(a)jwz.org&gt; wrote: I use SDDR-31 successfuly since 2001, it's a great device with [almost] no serious firmware problems which plague this kind of peripherals. This is not good, because -71 is a low-level protocol error. Usually it is called by things like a bitstuffing violation, a missing token, etc. I cannot speculate what causes it, but every component has to be excluded by replacement. We can exclude readers now, so it leaves motherboard chips and traces, cables, possibly a hub, and most especially any power supplies involved. Sometimes it happens when people connect external VGA to a laptop, go figure! (I am not saying this is your problem, obviously). I know who I am dealing with, Jamie, but for the list archives: DO NOT exclude two articles at a time. If you replace the laptop, leave all cabling, hubs, and the reader, in place. To be frank, it is possible for the software to report -71 for a bad reason, when it is confused. Once we excluded everything else, with the computer itself, it's time to look at UHCI root hub handling. We'll take it from there. This is very interesting, but I don't think I can act upon this section of your report, especially that it appears to relate a past experience. Let's concentrate on -71s. BTW, I should note that it is possible to use a passive PCMCIA-CF adapter. I have one of those as well, and it works great. The only reason I used SDDR-31 is that my only PC Card slot was often used by a wireless card. Eventually I got used to it. Also, in older distros and kernels it was required to stop and start pcmcia services when you plug the thing, and USB always was 100% hotplug, at least in theory. -- Pete