rleighton. I have a workaround for this problem.
The php file that causes a random password to be generated for the admin account during the installation process is located at: <Blogfolder>/wp-admin/includes/upgrade.php. The specific line that causes this behavior is 61. You can comment out that line and cause the password to be something that you specify instead of a randomly generated password. When it creates the table, it will create it with the password that you chose, and this will let you login the first time. After that I haven't had any problems. Change 61 to these two lines:
// $random_password = wp_generate_password();
$random_password = "my_special_password";
It will still hang, but it will have created the admin account with the password that you specify. Wait 5-10 seconds after running the script, then refresh the page and login with that password.
samboll - your suggestion doesn't make much sense; maybe you don't understand what the problem is. The problem is that the installation script hangs and never reports what is the random password that it generated. Since the password is encrypted in the database, there is no way to login to the admin account that first time, and therefore, though the installation is successful despite the hang, it is useless.