WD Caviar Green 3TB for Storage, when attached won't allow boot past Gigabyte Splash screen

[numnumnum]

I have formatted a 3TB WD Caviar Green in exFAT to use across my dual boot Hackintosh (10.8.3). Whether I plug it into my extra Sata2 port, or into a USB port, my comp wont get past the Gigabyte splash screen.

I thought it was the boot order, but I checked and don't think that is it. When remove it and I plug in a 2TB Seagate Barracuda with some old time machine backups on it into the same ports, it works fine.

If i plug in the 3TB exFAT drive *after* i boot to one of the OSs, then I can use it fine in either win7 or ML.

Any thoughts on what can be the issue? I had piggybacked on another's post, but I'm not getting any suitable answers so I thought I'd make my own.

Thanks

 

[bertho87]

Hello,

I have the exact same issue you described. Same Motherboard manufacturer and same problem when I attach my brand new WD Green 3 To. Did you find a solution finally ?

Thanks,

 

[treuben]

The bios option "enable USB Storage" or some such causes boot loaders and various things to hang at boot when Western Digital external USB storage is connected. Sometimes probing the drives even causes them to go offline and need to be power cycled. If you disable this option on Gigabyte boards series 6 you should be ok. No fix as yet.

 

[clipper99]

Just a heads-up. If you think you'll EVER want to take the drive out of its enclosure and install it internally...DO IT NOW!!

Most external hard drive manufacturers, WD especially, have some kind of data encryption going on in the USB-SATA interface they use. It it totally transparent to the end-user until you mount the drive internally and your OS tells you you have a blank drive!

I found out the hard way. Had to put the drive back in its enclosure then purchase an additional drive of greater capacity to transfer the data too, and only then could I use the drive. Even then, it still needed to be formatted. What a royal PITA!

The interweb is littered with info on the issue.

Regards