I have the one big plug going into the motherboard over near the ram and I have another one near the sink(sink power I think), and another bigger one near the sink(CPU power I think).
Is the second motherboard plug as big as the first?
Both power plugs are in the gpu.
Have not started it with 1 stick of ram. That is what I kind of meant about the benchmark testing.
It says to plug CPU, heatsink, 1 stick of ram, graphics card in and see if it does something on the screen. It then says to add one part at a time and continue to run benchmark test after every part, basically start it up after every part is added.
You should have a big 24pin plug to the motherboard by the RAM
You should have an 8pin plug at the top left corner
Those are the two connections from the psu, that third one you are talking about is it the little three pin fan connection from the cpu cooler?
Start with one stick or RAM and if that doesn't work switch slots and see if that makes a difference. Good idea to start with the bare bones and then add one component at a time.