readynas 4.x password length issue

Hi,
First post. Woo.


BACKGROUND:
So the password that I use for the admin profile is 23 characters long and includes UPPER, lower, symobls, and numerics.

PROBLEM:
When attempting to change the password, the interface accepts the new one, but the new password doesn't stick. When I try to log in with the new password, it doesn't work; only the old password actually works.

MORE SYMPTOMS:
Further, I used the reset password option at https://biznatch/password_reset and had a new password sent to my email. Again, when I tried to login to the interface, the password remained the same as it was before--my original 23 char one.

MORE INFO:
I started tracking down this problem when I tried to enable ssh. I was after inspection of the chron jobs because my disks spin down, and then back up immediately. From the log, something is authenticating and causing the disks to spin up:

Dec  9 23:16:46 biznatch noflushd[1817]: Disks spinning up after 15 minutes.
Dec  9 23:17:01 biznatch CRON[5446]: (pam_unix) session opened for user root by (uid=0)
Dec  9 23:17:02 biznatch CRON[5446]: (pam_unix) session closed for user root
Dec  9 23:22:09 biznatch noflushd[1817]: Spinning down disks.

The result of logging in with ssh and my 23 char password resulted in the "Permission denied, please try again." message, so I began a long search as only a good troll can do and found nothing on these forums. Here's where my debug path hit a wall. I'm pretty sure this is a bug in the Raidator web software. Anyway, during the debug of the ssh password issue, I found that I had WINS server enabled. I disabled it, and my disks haven't spun up for a while now. I think that fixed the spin-up, spin-down issue.. great. Now about the password.

WORRIES:
I understand that the ssh root password is configured to be the same as the current admin password adn that the only way to change the ssh root password is through the ssh interface, using the cmd passwd. So assuming that I can find a way to reset my password (thankfully, I actually know my 23 character password...), how will I push the new password to the already-setup ssh addon?


SETUP:
Hostname: biznatch
Model: ReadyNAS Ultra 2 Plus [X-RAID2]
Firmware: RAIDiator 4.2.19
Memory: 1024 MB [DDR3]
Volume C: Online, X-RAID2, 2 disks, 28% of 2305 GB used (two 2.5TB drives)

Here is the message in the log showing that the password was changed:

Dec  9 23:36:26 PST 2011!!root!!Successfully changed password. [admin]

Here is the relevant area of the log, pertaining to ssh login:

Dec  9 23:53:01 biznatch CRON[9658]: (pam_unix) session opened for user root by (uid=0)
Dec  9 23:54:54 biznatch sshd[9887]: WARNING: /etc/ssh/moduli does not exist, using fixed modulus
Dec  9 23:54:54 biznatch sshd[9887]: error: Could not load host key: /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
Dec  9 23:54:59 biznatch sshd[9887]: (pam_unix) authentication failure; logname= uid=0 euid=0 tty=ssh ruser= rhost=192.168.X.X  user=root
Dec  9 23:55:01 biznatch sshd[9887]: Failed password for root from 192.168.X.X port 58157 ssh2
Dec  9 23:56:54 biznatch sshd[9887]: fatal: Timeout before authentication for 192.168.X.X