Ok, building a new system for my cousin, and I have run into a wall that I haven't hit before. Everything it put together, connected all the wires, etc, flip the switch and starts up nicely. By that I mean the fans all whirr to life and I have power to everything. However, after this happens, I relize that there is nothing going on as far as booting goes and then shut it down. My motherboard (MSI) came with a "D-bracket" which has led's to step ya through the boot process. According to it, the processor is damaged/Improperly installed. Well, it's not improperly installed, this is like the 4th XP 2600 based system I've built this summer. So I'm left to believe that this is a damaged processor. However, I have never had one, so I don't know what happens when you do. If anyone can give me an answer as to if this sounds like a bad processor or not, I'd sure like to know.

Thanks

RMA! Can't go wrong assuming you can get a new one still.

You can get bad CPU’s, and Bad Sockets. You seem like a bright guy so I assume you have done this stuff and I am saying it for my own amusement.
Reset the bios, make sure it is set up alright with your memory speed.
Look at the CPU for damage, bent pins, missing pins, extra.
Look at the socket for damage, and make sure that the mother board is properly mounted, meaning take it off and remount it. Inspect the bottom of the board for damage, inspect the top.
Check to make sure your heat sink is connecting ok. No matter how many times you do it you can still mess up with the thermo grease.
Work on a clean static free bench, not in your case. (case grounding issue)
If you have extra parts, try a better power supply, with unneeded cards, ports turned on in bios.
Try your CPU in a different machine.
Try a different CPU in the machine that you know works.

Pull the RAM and/or vidcard and see if you can get the BIOS to beep at you. If you don't get any beeps it's probably the proc.

I dont think his MSI beebs.

I cannot get into the bios, when I said I couldn't boot, I was refering to the bios loader, not an os. I get black screen when I power up. I am planning on trying the proc from this computer on it possibly, but I really don't want to, because my turbine heatsink on this is a bitch to get in/out. Also, I get no beep at startup, the CD Drive whirrs to life for a few seconds, then bubkus. Basically i need to know what happens if you have a bad processor. Does the bios load?

The BIOS usually will not load, since it needs the proc to execute its code. Unless you have some sort of weird uber-BIOS that does all kinds of neat stuff like not requiring a proc to boot.

there should be a 4 pin leader on the motherboard around where you connect the HD led and power led labeled "SPEAKER". hook a case speaker up to that and see if it beeps like mad.

Or your motherboard might be like mine and have voice reports rather than just beeps. When I called ASUS about mine, they told me I had to actually plug my PC speakers into the integrated audio output slot in order to get my error reports.

I realize your motherboard is an MSI, but you might try that if you don't get any beep codes the old fashioned way.

Conclusion, Bad Motherboard.

After all the pieces off of the new board and testing them in my own system, I've drawn the conclusion that the mobo is bad. Thanks for the input though.

I have an MSI if it says you have improperly installed CPU or Damaged CPU then it is the CPU. If no leds come up then it is a the MOBO. But since you have leds then it is the proc. You got sent a bad cpu, get it replaced. Thats what RMAs are for.