Help Maxtor HD stalls during format

[Mitch]

Been trying to install RH 7.3 on a Maxtor 8.4 gb drive model 88400D8.  I get as far as the “Installing Packages” screen and the “Formatting/Filesystem box pops up and fills with only 1 grey square and then the install just stops.  The hard drive is okay as it was previously running Lycoris Desktop/LX in the same PC and I also ran MaxBlast to verify the hard drive is okay.  I called Maxtor but they were no help..mumbled that Linux not officially supported but that it should work.  I successfully swapped in a different hard drive (Maxtor 20.4 gb) and had no problems with Formatting/Install.    I would really like to get RH 7.3 installed on this drive and would appreciate any suggestions.   Just out of curiosity I will download Mandrake and/or SuSe later today and try to install them on this drive as Lycoris installed and ran with no trouble.   Mitch