System halts after loading miniroot.gz

Knoppix cannot boot, not even in failsafe mode. In normal mode, screen goes black
after "Loading miniroot.gz.....".

In failsafe, the last 3 messages are

>SMP motherboard not detected
>enabled ExtINT on CPU#0
>ESR value before enabling vector: 00000002

Any ideas? I 've got a Soltek SL-75FRV motherboard,
the lspci -v output is:

00:00.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 3189
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 0000
Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 8
Memory at e0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=64M]
Capabilities: [a0] AGP version 2.0
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

00:01.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device b168 (prog-if 00 [Normal decode])
Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=01, subordinate=01, sec-latency=0
Memory behind bridge: dde00000-dfefffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: cdd00000-ddcfffff
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.0 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. UHCI USB (rev 80) (prog-if 00 [UHCI])
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc. UHCI USB
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 11
I/O ports at e800 [size=32]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.1 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. UHCI USB (rev 80) (prog-if 00 [UHCI])
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc. UHCI USB
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 5
I/O ports at ec00 [size=32]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.3 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 3104 (rev 82) (prog-if 20)
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 3104
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 10
Memory at dfffff00 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:11.0 ISA bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 3177
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc.: Unknown device 0000
Flags: bus master, stepping, medium devsel, latency 0
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

00:11.1 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. Bus Master IDE (rev 06) (prog-if 8a [Master SecP PriP])
Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc. Bus Master IDE
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 14
I/O ports at fc00 [size=16]
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

00:11.5 Multimedia audio controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. AC97 Audio Controller (rev 50)
Subsystem: Avance Logic Inc.: Unknown device 4720
Flags: medium devsel, IRQ 5
I/O ports at e400 [size=256]
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 (GeForce2 MX) (rev b2) (prog-if 00 [VGA]) Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 248, IRQ 11
Memory at de000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
Memory at d0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
Expansion ROM at dfef0000 [disabled] [size=64K]
Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [44] AGP version 2.0