My dell xp on startgivestwo short beeps then it says f1 to retry boot f2 utility

Sounds to me like a faulty hard drive. Does your hard drive show up in the bios?

Reseat your ram modules,then try to boot.A ram stick may be loose.

i regularly see all this beep beep related queries. Every bios maker have a list all possible beep beep combinations. U can get info from their respective sites or even a google search will help. from boot menu identify u bios maker and there u go beep beep.

A double beep on my optiplex was a loose ram module.

2 beeps is indeed indication that the system is not detecting any ram.
what you can do is to check if you memory is secured probaly in the sockettes.
otherwise run memory diagnostics to see if one of the modules is defect and replace it with new ones.