On February 4, three days ago i had recompile Panic kernel so now support firewire devices. I recompile them into modules, so will be loaded by Panic at first boot by script /etc/rc.d/rc.modules like here:
# add firewire ieee1394 support
/sbin/modprobe ieee1394
/sbin/modprobe raw1394
/sbin/modprobe ohci1394
/sbin/modprobe dv1394

You can disable firewire support in Panic if your computer doesnt have firewire card by add # on front of above command.

i also had done install some libraries that needed by common application that use firewire (visit http://www.linux1394.org for more details). I hope this can running smoothly and automatically detect your firewire devices :)