I have been running my family’s website on an old computer and the motherboard died. I got different motherboard and processor I had in my basement and put it in.

When I am booting, it first goes to “GNU GRUB version 0.94” and list my OS “Fedora Core (2.6.10-1.771_FC2)”, it says it will boot in 8 seconds. When the time is up it goes to a black screen for a second and then it reboots.

I haven't formated since the new mobo install. I had hoped I could just put in the replacement and run with that. I have a backup, but I've done alot of work to set up fedora how I want it and don't really want to try and figure out how I did it all over again.

I am running Fedora Core 2, which runs x-windows with gnome. I don’t know Linux overly well, but I’ve managed so far. So if anyone can help me, please explain very well for someone who’s a noob.

I'm not really familiar with FC2 but check if it has an upgrade or repair option on the install cd. Probably doesn't boot cause the new motherboard uses a completely different chipset. Windows xp would not boot either if you just stick a new mobo in without doing a "repair install" or "inplace upgrade". If that doesn't work try upgrading with a newer version of fedora.

I managed to pause the screen for that instant before the computer reboots. The text there is:

Booting 'Fedora Core (2.6.10-1.771_FC2)

root(hd0,0)
Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0x83
kernel .vmlinuz-2.6.10-1.771_FC2 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
[Linux-bzImage, setup=0x1400, size=0x165eob]
initrd /initrd-2.6.10-1.771_FC2.img

I looked that the rescue CD and there the only thing I was able to do is get it to mount my hdd and send me to the comand prompt.

If I upgrade to a newer Fedora Core will I lose all my configurations? I have some things boot on startup and I've changed things in x-windows so I can use x-11VNC in a graphic enviroment. I don't remember what I did.

The easy way out of this is to install a more modern distro---FC2 is pretty old. If you have important files on the disk, then the best way might be to buy another drive, install a new distro, and then copy over files from the existing drive.
Other options include booting from a "Live CD" such as Knoppix--to try and recover the exsiting system---or maybe just to get some important files onto a CD.

For even MORE brilliant advice, post the specs on the hardware: Processor, speed, RAM, HD size, etc.

Well I tried to upgrade to Fedora Core 4 last night and the computer would re-boot every time it tried to load a graphical environment. The Motherboard I’m using has on-board video so I’m guessing it’s an issue with that. I have an old dell floating around somewhere so I’m going to try that next and see if it’s just this crappy Compaq mother board.

+1 HD
have once move one HD to another mobo and it worked fine,
was so impressed by Linux :-), but this was a modern mandriva distro
which run hardrake (material detection) and this was
from a PIII to a PIV if I remember ok.
Anyway this is luck of the draw

Sounds bad, should not reboot. Is the mobo ok?
You can try kernel parameter video=vesa

FC6 is out, maybe you could try Fc5, not fc4, do not know

>>Well I tried to upgrade to Fedora Core 4
Upgrade or resinstall fully?
I doubt an upgrade would work very well, but at least some
of the settings would not be lost
I hope you made a backup at least of /etc if you have settings in there
and I assume /home is on a different partition
if fc4 cd boots there must be a rescue mode to get to a command line
mode to at least backup /etc (hint cp -R)