Im building my own computer. I have an Athlon 64 3700+ processor, 200GB HDD, ABIT motherboard, and 1GB stick of RAM. I HOOKED my pc up to my other computer's monitor so i could start installing drivers and the OS and what not. I started up my PC and it went into BIOS for about 7 seconds the the whole console shut off. When i started it up again the monitor wouldnt display anything.....i was thinking about it and since i dont have a heat sink for my CPU i thought that might be way it shut off itself. What do you think??? oh and which drivers should i install first? I have the HDD driver, the motherboard driver, and my graphics card driver to install....should i install one of these first or the OS first? thanks alot everyone!Sylent...... Well ...for openers , I wouldnt be powering up without a heat sink and CPU cooling fan ........ I would also suggest looking at the cd that came with the mobo ........on another pc .....it should give you the proper procedure ....... REMEMBER the old saying ...when in doubt read the instructions ......

dl65 Wihout a heat sink it will not run for long. Once you get that installed you can proceed, bu not until. alright thanks alot GUYS....i APPRECIATE it. Hi Sylent,
Hope you did not burn your CPU up. If you do put your heat sink on your CPU do a search on the web for thermal grease applications and get you some instructions. Its all over the web if not here. Just joined and read your post and did not get to SURF the site yet.

This site has some good instructions

www.arcticsilver.com/arctic_silver_instructions.htm

Good luck!