I'll start by saying I'm not new to pc's, I just don't have any formal training. I have done countless hardware changes to my computers in the past with acceptable results.

Today however I needed to install a new CD-RW and to do this I had to remove the "bay box" of my dell. I had to disconnect all of the ide and power supply leads. (I have two HD's and two CD drives). Once I had the new CD in I connected everything back and started up.

No video.

I changed a couple of cables around blindly and I got video. But it ask me if I wanted to boot to safe mode. I thought that it may have been because I had to power down because of the no video thing. I booted to safe mode and it atomatically restarted and ask me the same question again. it did this three times before I gave up. Now I have tried what I feel is every possible cable combination. I have even tried not connecting CD drives, a hard drive and still no solution.

Right now I do not have video again and I can't figure out what is wrong.

So I through myself humbly at your mercy.

Do you see the BIOS POST or Dell logo screen?

Is this an OEM XP?

Do you have recovery disks?

I see the dell logo and then the boot screen, asking which os to use. (by the way this was all working untill I unplugged the cables. So software is ok. maybe which HD is master and in position 1 is wrong? maybe it is trying to boot to the wrong drive. When I unplugged the HD with the OS and tried to start(when I had video) it told me it could not find the OS. SO now that its not doing anything I don't know what its thinking.

I would try just the hard drive with the OS.
Put it on the end of the IDE Primary cable (make sure the red edge is next to the power cable; should be red right from rear). Also re-plug the cable on board.
What happens now?

Also can you enter the BIOS Setup? Verify that the drive is seen; also verify Boot is set to hard drive.