old compaq 4840 problems - freebsd 4.3

[fadeaway at gmail.com]

I have a old compaq presario 4840.
I want to install freebsd 5.3 onto it but it just won't install...
It boots the installation and process everything accordingly until when 
it starts to format the disk and starts installing...
First off I notice it has problems fsck, it will error with a message 
like could not fsck something /xxxxx /mnt/xxxxx. Sorry I forgot to 
write down the exact message. Then it will tell me it is preparing an 
emergency holo shell? It will then proceed to try and install from 
(CD/FTP- tried both) and toward the end of the install it will error 
and tell it is going to reboot or i can enter a command prompt.

But! on freebsd 4.11 and previous versions I remember worked fine. Same 
thing with Openbsd 3.x and netbsd 2.0 installations...

Any ideas? I really want to give freebsd 5.3 a go...