I can't quite offer an explanation for it, but the solution was
to force both the ehci-hcd and usb-ohci modules to load in order
by adding the following to /etc/modules.conf (order matters)
### USB
alias usb-controller usb-modules
probeall usb-modules ehci-hcd usb-ohci
-dean takemori
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 13:47:28 -1000
From: Dean Takemori <deant@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: USB buses deregister themselves on boot
Message-ID: <22DD97AC-ED83-11D8-9198-000A95AF6760@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
Hello,
I'm running FC1+Updates, with a self-compiled 2.4.22-1.2199.nptl
kernel.
On bootup, the USB busses seem to deregister themselves and remove
the relevant modules. A snippit from dmesg shows this ...
<SNIP>
BUT, if I wait for the system to finish booting and manually
load usb-ohci by hand as root, the attached USB
devices are loaded and any appropriate modules are loaded ...
