Plugged it in and nothing happened except the fans were all running. Turns out I had the FSB dip switches (Soltek mobo) reversed. Then it couldn't recognize any of the IDE devices. Turns out the connector on the DVD drive was upside-down. After those minor corrections I'm in the BIOS and waiting for advice on the OS installation. My son thinks maybe we should install W98 first and play with things and when we're sure we know what we're doing scrub reformat the HDD and install XP, especially in light of the 30 day grace period. I think we should just go ahead and do the XP install - any thoughts? Remember this is our first modern build. So far things are looking good and we thank everyone who has made suggestions along the way. Bob Warasila [log in to unmask] (home) [log in to unmask] (work) The NOSPIN Group is now offering Free PC Tech support at our newest website: http://freepctech.com