HD Install :: drive weirdness

i got 2 usb hard drives plugged in next to each other & dsl is only seeing one (as sda). the other usually shows up as sdb but dsl is ignoring it.

also i dont seem to be able to gain control of fstab, i tried adding 'dsl nofstab' to my grub append line (I already have 'dsl alsa') but again dsl ignores my fstab edits.

Any ideas?

original here.