Weird problem

[dnanian]

Yes, it's very significant. The 400GB WD SATA drives are well known for having problems with the G5's controller:

Western Digital has now stated that the WD4000KD drive (and some others) don't work in Power Mac G5's:

"The Apple G5 tower does not support certain standard Serial ATA interface protocols used by the WD4000YR, WD4000KD, WD1500AHFD, and WD1500ADFD hard drives resulting in an interface lock-up. This causes the computer system to hang. The only work-around we have identified at this time is installing a SATA Host Bus Adapter (controller card), effectively circumventing the on-board interface."

The URL to this article is: http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc....p?p_faqid=1415

There is a long thread with user comments about this specific issue at http://xlr8yourmac.com/feedback/WD4000_G5problems.html and it is suggested there that the problem might not affect dual core machines, but it definitely seems to be present in single-core machines.

As far as installing an OS onto either drive -- it should just work, Chris. I haven't had any problems... but this could be another issue with the WD.