First Powerup

Now comes the moment of truth. Make sure everything is plugged in, all the fans, the motherboard's power connector, the CPU +12V connector, the video card's extra power connector, and the drives. Hookup the monitor and plugin the power cord. If your power supply has a switch on the back make sure it's in the on position then press the power button on your case. With any luck the fans should all spin up and hopefully you'll get a monitor signal and maybe a beep or two.

If the fans spin up but you get nothing on the monitor and a long series of beeps (if you have a speaker) then something is installed incorrectly. You may be able to find the beep codes in the manual or online. Some really nice motherboards have an LED display that shows the error code. Usually it's the RAM, CPU, or video card that is installed incorrectly. Most of time it's the RAM that causes the problem and can be fixed by removing all but one stick for now. If that fails then removing and reseating the other components may be required.

If nothing happens then either you hooked up the case's power switch incorrectly or it's a power connection issue. Check all the connections again making sure you have both the motherboard's 24 pins all connected and have the correct 4 or 8 pin +12V connector plugged in. If you still get nothing then you may want to unplug the drives and remove any extra expansion cards to minimize possible problems and try again.

If you still can't get anything you may have a bad PSU or motherboard. You can test the PSU by unplugging all the motherboard power connectors and then using a paperclip bent into a 'U' shape. Insert one end into the contact with the green wire and the other end into one of the contacts with a black wire. The power supply and anything hooked to it should power on.

Initial Setup and Testing

On first bootup you will want to enter the BIOS configuration. This can usually be done by hitting DEL or F2 right after power on. You may be dumped into it automatically on your very first bootup.

The first thing I like to do is update my BIOS to the latest version. This can fix a lot of RAM and other stability issues. On newer motherboards you can copy the update to a USB stick and do it right from the BIOS configuration screen, if your motherboard doesn't support this you may need to use a floppy or a bootable CD. After the update it's good to reset your BIOS settings and reboot.

Enter the BIOS again and make sure all the settings are correct. Most of the time the RAM will be set to very conservative settings and will need to be changed to the correct ones printed on the RAM or found online. If you had to remove some RAM to get the system to boot you may now save and shutdown then install all your RAM.

These days RAM has a pretty high defect rate and it's always a good idea to test it. Download and burn Memtest86+ to a CD and run the test until it makes at least one complete pass. This usually takes about an hour. If any errors appear and you're sure the RAM settings are correct then your RAM is probably defective and you'll have to replace it before continuing.

If you're going with a RAID setup then you will have to enable RAID in your BIOS, configure what SATA ports will be used for RAID, then enter your RAID BIOS which usually comes right after your motherboard BIOS and configure the drives for the correct RAID type. More info should be found in your motherboard manual.