It could have broke connection or even shorted out the cable, I would maybe try to power it on with the video cable unhooked, and see if it POSTs on VGA. Is this one of those plastic ribbons or is it actual "wire" cable? I have had where the plastic ribbon type ones go into the connector slightly cockeyed and can make connection with the wrong pins, could maybe be misaligned in the plug. Without actually seeing any of this I'm just guessing based off work I've done on other laptops, PDAs, cell phones, and the like that use those cheap plastic ribbon cables. Maybe Chuck(G) can chime in again since it sounds like he is familiar with this exact model, I worked on a Compaq that looked similar on the outside, but it was an AMD K6 platform, so its not even going to be close on the inside.