smbfs woes

I found today that smbfs no longer does the job as it used to.
I don't know whom to blame, but seems that the latest samba upgrade on server side (linux x86, debian, now samba 3.2.5) is the main suspect.
Symptoms:

1. names are 8.3 uppercase regardless server settings and "case" keyword in smbfs command.

2. I get weird error message upon connection , but successive disconnects and connects reder the smbfs unusable
The weird message (every successfull connect):

7.AOS4.1:Libs> smbfs domain home user jack device wd2 volumename wd2 //aetpy/wd2
smbfs: Unknown error - (1, 87).
Connected '//aetpy/wd2' to 'wd2:'; "Break 7" or [Ctrl-C] to stop... smbfs domain home user jack device wd2 volumename wd2 //aetpy/wd2


Restarting network doesn't help.
Sfter a while it can be persuaded to connect, there's no trace in the server's logs while connection fails but there's a probably relevant message just before the connectivity gets resumed:

[2009/01/22 02:49:27, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection_snum(1194)
aeone (::ffff:192.168.123.14) connect to service wd2 initially as user jack (uid=1001, gid=1001) (pid 6304)
[2009/01/22 02:49:28, 1] smbd/service.c:close_cnum(1405)
aeone (::ffff:192.168.123.14) closed connection to service wd2
[2009/01/22 02:58:15, 0] smbd/negprot.c:reply_negprot(531)
negprot protocols not 0-terminated
[2009/01/22 02:58:15, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection_snum(1194)
aeone (::ffff:192.168.123.14) connect to service wd2 initially as user jack (uid=1001, gid=1001) (pid 6348)
[2009/01/22 02:58:18, 1] smbd/service.c:close_cnum(1405)
aeone (::ffff:192.168.123.14) closed connection to service wd2

The scenario is as follows according to the log:
2:49:27 connection
2:49:28 disconnection
then 9+ minutes of failed connections that generate the following on amiga side:

7.AOS4.1:Libs> smbfs domain home user jack device wd2 volumename wd2 //aetpy/wd2
smbfs: Cannot connect to server (5, Input/output error).

2:58:15 complaint about not --terminated something, then successful connect


Did anyone experience similar stuff?
Any ideas?
TIA,
Jack

Edit: reverting to samba 3.0.27 on the server side helped. God bless /var/cache/apt/archives.