Hi,
 >> When the installer starts downloading files, it logs into the FTP correctly, 
 >> and starts extracting files, but stops at "./bin/ksh" and I get:
 >> 
 >> sd0(esp0:3:0): esp0: timed out [ecb 0xf03150d0 (flags 0x3, dleft 10000, stat 
 >> 0)] <state 4, nexus 0xf03150d0, phase(l 3,c 3, p 3), resid b200, msg(q 0, o 
 >> 0) >
 >> sd0(esp0:3:0): max sync rate 10.0MB/s
 >> 
 >> and finally after 10 of those messages I get:
 >> 
 >> sd0(0:3:0) command aborted, data = 00 00 00 00 47 00 01 00 00 00
 >> sd0(0:3:0) command aborted, data = 00 00 00 00 47 00 01 00 00 00
 >> sd0(0:3:0) command aborted, data = 00 00 00 00 47 00 01 00 00 00
 >> sd0(0:3:0) command aborted, data = 00 00 00 00 47 00 01 00 00 00
 >> 
 >This is disk. Were you able successfully label/newfs it?
 >Is it known to work?
 
well, I've got similar timeouts when installing from _cdrom_
(SparcStation Classic, Sun(Toshiba)-CDROM), using a recent
(exact date unknown, 1.5BETA, but too 1.4.2) miniroot.fs.

Huge data traffic (untarring base.tgz) seems to be a serious
problem. Technically, an installation of OpenBSD or SunOS5.2
went without such trouble, so there doesn't seem to be something
like improper SCSI-termination.

Of course I'm able to mount the disk/cdrom an do 'harmless'
things like 'more Install.txt'.

HTH,
tino (currently out of time to investigate further :(