Power but no boot

[Kipper717]

My PC doesn't want to boot anymore. When I power up I hear the hard drive start but then nothing happens. The access light on my 2 CD drives light up alternately and there are LED's lit on the MB but that's it. I have my Win98 disk in the CD but that doesn't work and I tried booting from the floppy but the PC doesn't look at floppy drive. I have a P4 1.6 w/ an Intel MB ( not sure model#) AND 765 MB of ram. Over the weekend I pulled one of the ram chips and the PC booted up so I figure the video card is OK. It worked for the night but when I went back the next day it wouldn't do anything again. I was able to copy files from the hard drive so it looks like that's not the problem.
Basically I would like to know what kind of problem I might have if the PC powers up but wont boot from the floppy or CD.
Anybody have any ideas what might be going on?

 

[JMaster]

you sure the ide cables aren't backwards?
it seems to be ide device problems to me.... like check master/slave device settings also.

 

[Zepper]

Boilerplate-01:
. Most frequent causes of failure to boot:
1- RAM, CPU or AGP video card not seated properly, or a bent pin.
2- Drive data cable on upside down or only on half the pins or shifted . a pin or two (usually Floppy or Zip drives).
3- CMOS needs to be cleared (AC power must usually be disconnected or . attempt to clear CMOS may fail) Unless your mobo does not use a power-off CMOS clear - check your mobo manual for specific info.
4- On some new mobos there is a CPU protection feature (esp. on Asus/Asrock Athlon/Socket A mobos) that will not allow the system to start if there is no fan (or a fan without a working speed sensor wire) connected to the fan power connector on the mobo (specifically marked "CPU Fan"). If you tried to start your machine without a fan properly connected, you have to attach a proper and working fan and clear the CMOS before it will boot.
.bh.
:moon: