My new gaming rig.

Specs
Geforce 9800 GT 1gb DDR 3
Intel Core 2 Quad 2.3 ghz @ 1333
Gigabyte S-Series Ep43-ds3l
4 gb Kingston Value Ram ddr2 pc2 6400 800 mhz
Samsung HD 1TB SATA (for storage)
Some random 160 GB SATA HD (for OS)

So first I put all this together with a 450 watt PSU...

No dice. The PSU popped and I had to replace it..... with a nice Antec 550 W psu...

Put everything back together and plugged it in and flipped the PSU switch! and it came alive! LED's Fans, CPU, GPU HUZZAH!!!!

Only problem is now when I plugged it into my dads monitor (the one im typing on right now...)

nothing came up...theres no beeps or anything...just the CPU running and the sound of things coming to life...

I'd like to think that my CPU has not been fried by the PSU pop...but its possible, though I'd like to think that there is something blatantly obviously wrong with it that im being a knuckle head about. I took off the CPU fan and heatsink and there was no physical damage to the CPU. (Though I'm still trying to figure out if I need thermal paste since none was included with the processor. Anothern note about the processor, it was bougth OEM from Frys on Black friday. They said it worked fine, but now that I am having issues, I'm begining to doubt that...

Note: a weird thing about this antec 900 case is that there are only 3 cords for the small things. PWR switch RST switch and HDD LED. None of them seem to work when plugged into what the mobo says is the correct place. I CAN'T hit the switch to turn my computer on, plugging it in and turning on the PSU powers it up.

any thoughts?