IBM Thinkpad 755CX

I've got an IBM Thinkpad 755CX that I'm trying to install Win98 on. It has a new 6 gig HDD & 40 meg RAM. The HDD installed fine & is formatted. I have a Backpack CDROM on the LPT port as the system is not equipped with a CDROM drive. I start the install & when it gets to the first screen for 'Gathering system information', it gives a short beep & hten freezes. I downloaded & ran the full diagnostic from the IBM site, & everything tested fine. I've tried FDISK'ing & formatting the HDD again. I've also tried another backpack CDROM & new drivers, but the system still freezes at the same point. It works fine in DOS. Anybody got any ideas?

Copy win9x to your hard drive and install from the hard drive.