Cannot boot debian 2.2r2

[Sante Gnerre <gnerre@math.berkeley.edu>]

Hello there,

I have an hung-up when I try to boot debian 2.2r2.

Hardware:
 P-120 motherboard - American Megatrend P5STE (AMIBIOS)
 16M RAM
 cd (Atapi, it's an old 4x NEC)
 Maxtor 30 Giga HD
 ATI Rage 128 video card with 16M
 ethernet card (I don't remember the model)
 Sound Blaster 16
 No floppy drive

The problem:
 I put cd1 in the cd tray and I boot from it. Everything seems to go
 really well (it recognize cd and HD geometry), but then it gets to
 the following line:
  sym53c416.c: Version 1.0.0
 and it just hungs-up.

Remarks:
 I tried to boot debian 2.2 (r1), and it fails in the same place.
 However, Redhat 6.2 works fine, I am totally puzzled! I tried to 
 unplug ethernet card and sound card, but it still hung up.
 

Any idea? Thanks a lot!

Sante
gnerre@math.berkeley.edu