BDI 2.18 install problem

[John Kasunich <jmkasunich-at-worldnet.att.net>]

I'm trying to install BDI 2.18 on an Allen Bradley 6180 industrial PC.
It boots from the CD-ROM and all goes well through the config part.
But when it starts the actual installation, things get VERY slow.
The help screen says 15-20 minutes.  Well, it takes 10 mins or
so to set up the file system.  Then that little dialog box goes away
and it just sits there.  It's not totally locked up - the mouse cursor
moves, and if I click on "Hide Help", it works.  But it's been about
50 minutes now, and it still hasn't even started installing packages.

This is a 200MHz Pentium, 430HX chipset motherboard.  64M of
x9 EDO ram, with ECC turned on.  I'm pretty sure the BIOS is a
customized Award, can't check right now cause I'm still waiting
to see if anything is gonna happen.  It has a 4G IDE drive on the
primary IDE, the CD-ROM drive is on the secondary.  There is a
proprietary ISA card that lets you use the front panel membrane
switches along with a conventional keyboard, but as far as I can
tell, that board only gets accessed when you want to change the
definitions of the front panel keys.  (I don't have the utility to do
that, which is a DOS/Windows thing anyway.)  I'm using an
external keyboard and mouse for the config.  The video is an
Allen Bradley board, but it uses a CHIPS B65555 chipset.
Linux autodetected the chipset as a CT65520.  The first time
I corrected it to CT65555, the second time I left it alone.
Both times, I was able to test X, and it seemed fine.
It also has a 3COM 3C905 10/100 NIC in it.  I assume Linux
detected that too, since it ran through the config screen for
eth0.

I'm not trying to do a dual boot or anything, just a simple
"wipe everything" install.  OK, it's been sitting there for an
hour, I'm gonna kill it.

I was wrong about the BIOS.  It is:

AMIBIOS  (C) 1992 American Megatrends, Inc.
(C) 1992-1997 Intel Corp.
BIOS Version 1.00.08.DB0

Looking in the BIOS setup, I see that the PnP config
is set for "Use setup utility", whatever that is.  I'm
gonna try setting it for a "Use ICU".

Oh well, I typed all this for nothing, now it's working
fine, less than 5 minutes and it's almost done.

That's odd.  After installing all the packages, it seemed
to stall.  Sat there doing nothing for several minutes till
I touched the mouse.  As soon as I moved the mouse
a dialog box popped up "Performing post install
configuration"

That dialog box is still there 5+ minutes later.  Mouse
pointer still moves, the "Hide Help" button doesn't respond.
No disk accesses for several minutes...

5 more minutes - it must be dead.  Power cycle.
Running through the BIOS setup, most stuff looks normal.
Things I don't understand:
ISA LFB size - choices are disabled or 1MB, currently disabled
PnP Config Mode - choices are "Use setup utility" and "Use ICU"
"Use setup utility" was really bad, currently set to "Use ICU"
When set for ICU, the next parameter is
"Boot with PnP OS", choices are None, Other, and Windows 95
was on None, trying Other

Let's see what happens...
NOT an improvement.  Crashed and burned part way through
loading packages.  "Multiple segmentation faults occurred;
can't display error dialog".  At least I didn't have to wait a long
time.  OK, we'll change "Boot with PnP OS" to "Windows 95"
(yuck - but it's the only choice left)

Trying again....
Same thing, crash and burn.  Almost looks like it's trying
to restart X - the startup screen (sort of a diagonal weave
pattern with an X cursor in the middle) popped up for a
split second before the crash.  After the crash, there are
messages starting with "(--) SVGA: XAA:" on the screen
before the final error message (in text mode, X is gone now).

Set PnP OS back to None.  Maybe this is X related.  During
monitor configuration, I set it to Generic Laptop Display Panel,
800x600.  This thing has an 800x600 flat screen, I have no idea
who made it.  All that does is set the Horizontal and Vertical
frequencies, right?  31.5-37.9 KHz hor, 40-70Hz vert.

It's still autodetecting a Chips and Technologies CT65520.
The numbers on the chip are B655555.  I'm gonna leave it
the way it is.  (I've tried changing it to CT655555, didn't seem
to make any difference).  It correctly detected 4M of video
memory.  Clicked on "Test this Config", worked OK.

Start the install.....
Formatting seemed to take a long time.  It was sleeping
again, touching the mouse woke it up.  (Which reminds me,
not really sleeping, all power management turned off in BIOS.)
OK, format is complete, the format dialog box is gone, but
nothing is happening.  This is where I started two hours ago.
It's 1:15 am, time to give it up.

HELP!

John Kasunich