Also check the bios and see what kind of setting you have on the sata controller, (actually you'll need to go into the sata bios not the motherboard bios unless they are better integrated these days)
They can be set to pretend to be IDE, or AHCI or A raid config. If you have the wrong or changed it after installing windows it can create a whole host of problems. You probably needed to install a raid/ahci controller driver DURING windows setup, if you did not then the floppy drive is probably the softwares best guess...
Defo get the fans working first, then check the wires for everything else, then wipe the hard drive, install windows (install the third party sata/raid/ahci drivers during windows set up (this can be difficult with windows xp) then install latest chipset drivers, then the device drivers, (modem, graphics card (this may require .net installed and direct x so I tend to do it last) audio, etc, etc) then update windows to the latest service pack.
If your bios says you need to update it to run the cpu properly then you should follow the instructions to do so from the motherboard's website, AFTER you have got the system running with some stability. Always be very cautious when flashing the bios...
Also Xander has a point, when I conntected up my last sata drive I found there were two sata ports reserved for pretending to be ide channels. This could be causing some of your floppy problems, if I recall correctly there is no need to try to put your hardrives on the first sata ports, port 6 works as well as port 1.
good luck...
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