The only time that ever happened to me was about eight or ten years ago when I set the jumpers on the hard drive to what they were 
"supposed" to be.  Bob Wright informed me that there was another group of settings for that drive, and when I used them I had no 
problems.  Evidently the bios got hung up reading the hard drives and never got beyond that point.  That is a long shot, but it is 
better than any other problem that might cause your failure to boot, for example the death of the motherboard.  :(   I suppose it 
could be something similar.  I have a computer now (bleeding edge - really bleeding!) that seems to hang before the BIOS kick in; 
if I wait two or three minutes they finally go, and if I turn the power off in the back of the computer when I shut down at night, 
it starts right up in the morning.  There are two things that you can try.

Go to the website of the hard drive to make sure that you have the proper settings.  Also,  disconnect everything except the 
keyboard, video card, and one stick of memory to see if you can get into the bios.  Getting into the bios is pretty critical, 
because if you can't do that, then the mb is probably gone.  If you can finally get into the bios, then add things in one piece at a 
time until you find the guilty party.

Dean


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Al Welch" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, April 26, 2008 8:12 PM
Subject: Re: [PCBUILD] Old Compaq SWV285


It does not boot to where I can get into the bios although the light on the
DVD does come on.

Nothing comes up on the monitor.


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