If you can access the drive and controller from another operating system, then it is not a problem with your hardware configuration. Controller properly configured, but not detected. Some BIOS-less SCSI controllers require the user to specify information about the controller at boot time. Hard drive geometry not recognized. Also, certain SCSI controllers need to be told where to find drive geometry in order for Linux to recognize the layout of your drive.
Most distributions provide a bootup option to specify the drive geometry.
After installing the Linux software, you will be able to install LILO, allowing you to boot from the hard drive. At that time, you can specify the drive geometry to the LILO installation procedure, making it unnecessary to enter the drive geometry each time you boot.