Help! Blank Screen After POST

[LorenM]

So this is my first build in almost ten years and all things considered it went better than I expected. Here's the setup

Mobo Asus Maximus Formula II
CPU Intel Core2 Quad Q9550 2.83ghz
2GB OCZ Reaper memory
ATI HD4850 from Asus
150GB WD Velociraptor HLFS
200GB Seagate Barracuda (from my old PC)
Rosewill 850W PSU
Asus DVD/CD Burner
Zalman 9700 heatsink/fan

My problem is after POST the screen just goes black, no DOS prompt or anything. I disabled the WD HDD and was able to boot up into my old Windows XP. So I'm guessing the problem lies with the WD HDD, but in windows I can access the drive and I even reformatted just in case there was some old data on there. Any Ideas? Any way for me to install Windows Xp Pro x64 onto the drive via my old drive? I would love to run my OS and games from the Raptor and keep my old HDD as a backup storage drive.

Many thanks in advance,
Loren

 

[Baez]

If I understand you correctly. You built a new computer and tried to boot Windows off of an old drive from your previous computer? I'm not too clear on what your exact problem is.

You need to perform what's called a repair install if you're trying to boot from an older hard drive. Windows needs to build a registry of your new hardware.

 

[LorenM]

Sorry for the confusion. I built a new computer and received no display after POST. Tried booting from the new Raptor HDD, nothing. Tried booting from CD with new Win XP Pro and still nothing. In an act of desperation I tried my old HDD from my previous computer and viola, I was able to boot into Win XP Media Center. I tried to format the new Raptor drive in Disk Manager and reboot but it didn't help. Folks at another forum suggested updating the BIOS or changing my SATA controllers but I have no clue how to go about that. Any suggestions are welcome and please remember I'm a Noob.

Thanks for your help,
Loren

 

[KSoD]

Okay chack your BIOS. Check under Boot. See what the boot order is. Make sure that the CD is before the Hard Drive. That will allow you to boot from CD.

From there get GParted LiveCD. You can use that to format the Raptor. Or you can just boot with the XP CD and start a setup and format the drive and exit out of the install after the drive is formatted.

 

[LorenM]

MAK213,
Thanks for your post, I've tried to boot from CD with no luck. I've also tried just CD-drive with no HDD connected and again no display after POST. I've tried both setting boot priority in BIOS and F8 to force boot from CD-drive with no luck. My display won't respond either, usually I'm able to shift the picture left or right but when this happens I'm not able to access the settings... Could it be a display problem? or an inability of the MoBo to communicate with the drives in question? Is there any Operating Sys I can try to install onto the Raptor from my old Windows environment so that I could see if that helps?

Limited success!
I was able to boot the Gparted Live CD, but don't really know what I'm doing after that. I then tried the Win XP Pro x64 CD again with no luck. My Win XP is OEM could that be the problem?

 

[KSoD]

Try boot disk.

Bootdisk.Com

There create a bootdisk on a USB drive. From there use FDisk to format the drive.

The only other option is to use a Linux LiveCD to boot up and try to see if that will access the Raptor. I know the Ubuntu LiveCD had GParted built right into it.