Hook up the HD and go into BIOS and see if the BIOS sees the HD. If it does, OK.
If no, the ide cable to the HD to mother board may be shorted out too, It does
not take much to hose the cable. Next is to check out the CD rom drive. It may
be the matter of being cleaned or it is going out. I think it is the matter of
being cleaned up with a CD or DVD clean cleaner disk. Or a nice can of air. If
you have a long Q tip, dip it in achole and whip off the laser. All so the ram
can be going bad. Ram for the old boxes new are cost quite a bit and find one
used may be the best route. It is a old box and things can be just going out.
All so put in mind it lived this far for a PII. All so did you look at the boot
sequence and make sure that the order of boot is CDROM first? If you have a
spare CDROM around slap that in and see if that goes. If the CPU is going out,
the machine is going to poop out here and there.