Trying to fix this same problem, and thought I'd share the solution I found elsewhere:

"Lilo did not surprise me again: on a 4 GB IDE that was set to "NORMAL" in BIOS, LILO hang with: "L 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 ...". Changing the translation to LBA solved the problem."

Worked for me. Give it a try.