IT Tech class help

I am working on a project for my IT training, and am baffled. we have these old compaq P! with 16 meg of ram (just in case we ruin something) but mine isnt goin so hot. we took inventory of each pc, and i got mine all put together, and it doesnt work. the lights go on, the hard drive spins, but thats it. no video, no beeps. i tried a PCI vid card (no AGP slot). it has onboard video. i reset CMOS, tried a different HDD, changed RAM, reseated processor. nothing seems to help. open to suggestions

 

maybe something fried? i know this may sound silly, but smell your cpu and other heat-sensitive parts to make sure nothing fried. also, ESD may have played a role in destroying some parts. you were using one of them grounding cord dealies, right? but the most probable culprit is user error. are you POSITIVE you put everything back in the right place? are you POSITIVE that it's not rigged to fail on you?

 

Yes im sure. the instructor checked it. no burning. im sure bout that too. yes had an ESD wristband. didnt test before i took it apart. thinking it may have been messed up beforehand, cause i was EXTREMELY careful. prolly just fried. thats why it wuz in the back room

 

make sure the motherboard isn't touching metal on the mounts. It could be shorting. Take some black electrical tape and place it over the mother board mounts on the case. Then screw the mobo onto the mounts.