Boot up. I just installed a new motherboard and can not get it to boot up...What can I do? It is the elite 780.

Hi mmm it sounds to me like your motherboard has got some problems. sometimes running system tests through the boot menu may help but should indicate weather you need a new motherboard or not. Sometimes a good clean inside computer is the way to go as well... Hope this helps
Kindest regards

You are going to need to start your computer in safe mode and find the XP drivers that will work for your motherboard manually from the web (Assuming that there are any created for XP for that board)..

That blue screen you keep getting is because you don't have the correct driver loaded for something on the motherboard that it needs to boot correctly and your XP install couldn't find it on the web to install automatically.

Start your PC and press F8 several times until the boot menu comes up. Then select "Safe Mode with Networking".

Now start looking for your drivers here:
http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/Product/optiplex-780

You are going to need to start your computer in safe mode and find the XP drivers that will work for your motherboard manually from the web (Assuming that there are any created for XP for that board). That blue screen you keep getting is because you don't have the correct driver loaded for something on the motherboard that it needs to boot correctly and your XP install couldn't find it on the web to install automatically.

Start your PC and press F8 several times until the boot menu comes up. Then select "Safe Mode with Networking".

Now start looking for your drivers here:
http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/Product/optiplex-780

turn on your dekstop. press the F2. Make sure the hdd is detected. it should display the name of your harddrive. then find the boot order and set the hard disk as the first priority boot order. press f10 and save.

You should be able to just put the Windows disk in CD or DVD drive and boot your PC, Then a boot from CD Screen should appeared. Then just hit "Enter" to start the XP wipe of hard drive and install. OR you can: Push the Delete several times at boot up and this will take you to BIOS. setup screen where you can adjust the settings you want.

if im correct, you havent installed a floppy drive yet...
while the comp is booting press esc (on some comps its F10 it should say on the screen) and access the boot sequence..in there there is a list of boot items...they always list floppy drive as the first boot drive in case you need to recover your comp...remove floppy drive from your boot list making sure that your hardrive (C) is first drive to boot.
After you get your comp set up, you may want to change that sequence in case you ever have problems with your HDD

add a comment if you need more help

if it was your cpyu, you wouldnt get error codes or beeps. perhaps the problem is your power supply or bad ram.

put old motherboard back in, check that all cables are connected

Start the system & enter you're bios & use you're manual to help guide you on this. Go to the Boot section of the bios. You can set the boot order. Normal boot order is like this:
1st boot device, floppy disk (if one is connected).
2nd boot device, cdrom drive
3rd boot device, hard drive
(Drive the has windows installed on it).
Save & exit the bios. The system will restart & windows should load. If it does not, than you picked the wrong hard drive.

Good luck!
Mike

So it seems you got the DDR / DDR2 side of the equation correct, but unknown to most, there is 'low' and 'high' density memory.

The density of memory refers to the number of chips used to make the total amount of memory that your memory stick contains. e.g. High density memory has few, large capacity chips to make up the 1024MB of memory on the stick, whereas low density memory uses many, small capacity chips to make up the same 1024MB total on the stick.

Typically, if it is a low / high density conflict, it is the 'low density' sticks only that will boot.

Me, I purchase Kingston memory when I'm unsure what the motherboard will be, and it has never failed to work.

I fix computers.