M2N-E, troublshooting advice?

I bought this board when my old system mysteriously powered down, never to boot again ( UPS and surge protected...) After doing a few brief tests I decided that the old K8N board had somehow just failed and read no further into it. Tried to salvage what I could for a new system, my hardrive - WD1600 IDE and a generic IDE cd/rw drive. Got the machine assembled today, attempted to boot - leds/ fans came on but no other response. Everything else I have checked on and is out of the box. Right now im pretty annoyed and think my old hd is dead, along with my cd drive. Though it doesnt seem that should be true... Simply put, the drives dont seem to be responding. No power up sequence or audible ques. Maybe I am just overlooking something?

In any case I am now on the market for a new HD and cd drive. wanna make use of my spiffy new sata.