[Cialug] New Computer Hardware Issue

[Todd Walton]

Summary
I have a newly built computer that won't boot.  I have everything
installed.  It has one hard drive and one DVD drive.  I hook up power
to everything and press the power button and...

Good
It seems as if the mobo powers up.  The CPU fan spins and the PCI
Express video card lights up and its fan spins.  The front LED lights
up red.

Bad
The front LED being red probably means bad.  The hard drive and DVD
drive don't power up at all.  I can't eject the DVD drive and none of
it lights up.  The hard drive isn't vibrating or making noise.  The
computer doesn't even get to BIOS.  At least it doesn't show on the
monitor.

Troubleshooting
I've used different power connectors and even swapped out the power
supply to no avail.  It does exactly the same thing.  So it can't be
the power supply.

I've disconnected and reconnected all cabling to the motherboard and the drives.

Funky Thing
When I disconnect the IDE cable to the optical drive, but leave power
plugged in, it'll turn on.  I can eject it and it winks its LED at me.
 So they must build drives to take input from the motherboard on
whether it's okay to power up or not.

Question
Any ideas what could be happening?

Signature
-todd