[Samba] VFAT filesystem and large files

[t-wynnychenko at northwestern.edu]

Hello 
I have used samba for many years, and it worked great (thanks!).
Anyway, I recently decided to add a USB drive to the server.
Currently running 2.6.29.2 linux kernel, debian etch.
samba version 3.0.24
The USB drive is VFAT

I am able to write small files  remotely to the USB drive (a few Kb, 10's of Kb) without a problem. 
However, whenever I try to write something "larger" (like 1 Mb), the client machine "freezes" for a 
while (about 1 minute or so), then returns an error saying the file could not be written.
However, if I look at the share under which the USB drive is mounted, a file exist, however, it is
all "0"'s.
If I log onto the server with ssh, i can cp large files from ext3 drive to the VFAT USB drive
without problems.

I found a post about this somewhere (I can't seem to find it again), which said this was a problem
with the VFAT code, not samba.

I was wondering, is this is the case?  is the is a work-around?  Basically, is there a way to write 
large files via samba to a VFAT USB drive?

thanks

bye - ted