Problems with GA-7VAXP Ultra

I'm new to building computers, but I have some experience with hardware. I just gathered all my components and put them together in what I think is the right configuration. What happens is I can turn on the system, but nothing comes up on the screen. The monitor is on but it acts as though its not connected to anything. I'm running with a AMD XP 2100+, it has a story behind it, I'll get to that later. I have Antec Reference Cooling fan and 256 Crucial PC2100 DDR Ram. I am going to use the RAID function so I have 2 Western Digital 7200rpm HDDs, they were plugged into the motherboard, but I removed them to limit the amount of variables in my problem. I also have a Samsung 52x24x52 cdrw and a Lite On 16x DVD. None of the drives are connected to any power or to the motherboard. I have tried two different video cards, one Nvidia MX420 64mb PCI card and an Nvidia TNT2 card. Neither of which put anything up on the screen or registered with the monitor.
The CPU I bought of a close friend which he had bought from Newegg.com sometime ago. It had never been used, just its old. I was wondering if this could somehow cause a problem with my motherboard.
If anyone has any responses or advice on where I went wrong, what could fix it, or what I should try to replace, PLEASE post a response or email me. Thanks for any and all help.

-walkitiki

What exactly happens? is it just the LEDs and fans work and nothing else happens?, Do you hear the HDD getting accessed?
What size brand PSU do you have?
Hood

Power supply is a turbolink 420watt power supply. Power goes to everything, fans come on everywhere, the RAM led is also on. The hard drives made a terrible noise on the intial power up, so I disconnected them and they havent been connected since, there was no display on the first power up.

Sounds like it could be a dead CPU or a bad PSU, the CPU is more likely though. Take a close look at the edges of the core and see if you have any chipping, if not then try and get your hands on another PSU to test it out. If you still cant get anything then its probably best to remove the mobo from the case and just have the min of components connected and test it on the bench, as it could be shorting with the case.
Strange about the HDD noise though, especially as it was more than one.
Hood

The CPU appears to have some damage, I'll head over to the local retailer sometime this weekend and see how it goes. I'll let you know what happens. Thanks hood.

ah hah! a dead cpu ws to blame. I bought a brand new XP 2200+ go that installed and booted up and the BIOS is up. ahh! words can't descibe my happiness. My first computer built from scratch! Time to start the overclocking, thanks for your help Hood...now I just need to configure the RAID...

No problem.
Did you notice the stepping of the CPU, makes a big difference when OCing.
Hood

RAID



Alright, I can get the BIOS up now. The hard drives are still making that terrible high pitched noise. The part that I'm confused about is which IDE slot my drives should go in. Right now I have the following:

Samsung CDRW
LiteOn 16x DVD
Western Digital 80gig 7200 rpm HD
Western Digital 80gig 7200 rpm HD

I want to use RAID and that's where I start running into problems. The manual isn't all that clear on which goes where. The jumpers on the two hard drives are set at master, and the DVD drive is the master and the DVD is the slave. I had the 2 optical drives on one cable going into IDE 1, and the two hard drives on their own cables going into 3 and 4. Any help is greatly appreciated.

-james

Heres what you will have to do(I am presuming you are using XP or W2K)
First you need to get the drivers for RAID copied to a floppy(you will have to do this on another computer obviously) Copy exatly the same directory structure as it is on the CD, you can delete files for other OS's etc that you dont need if nesescary so that it will fit on a floppy, but the directory structure must be intact.
Then with the HDD on 3 and 4 boot to the XP/W2K CD and start the install. During the install you will see that it asks you to press F6 to install third party drivers, press it and then further into the install it will ask for the files from the floppy. Just follow instructions.


The order of drives would be best as
Samsung CDRW Master on IDE 1
LiteOn 16x DVD Master on IDE 2
Western Digital 80gig 7200 rpm HD Master on IDE 3
Western Digital 80gig 7200 rpm HD Master on IDE 4


Hood

I've done what you suggested, it worked and it didnt. I did decide that the drives that I have are defective and I'm getting them RMA'ed. They were still very loud, and began clicking, so I'll just have to play around with the new ones when they get here.