Operating System Not Found after n- Wireless upgrade attempt

[jt20]

Working Thinkpad t-42

Bought the tp-link tl-wn861n.

Installed. Wires on correct plugs.

Also removed Hard drive to see specs (battery was out)

tried to boot: failed - tried some things in bios.

Checked online found out I needed to trick the IBM into accepting the card.

Opened back up - installed old card.

Reset bios to default

turned on : fail (something about checking cables? flashed on screen with an "ide" error)

Disabled wireless in bios

Turned on -fail

Removed wireless card

Turned on - fail

Tried rescue and recovery disk and set boot order to cd drive first.

Fail

Tried system recovery disk.

Fail.

I don't mind re-installing the OS again (ugh...) but I can not even boot from disk.

What have I done????

[jt20]

uhhhh.

ferget it.

The HD was not pushed in well enough.. heh

That [censored] holder has too much slop in it.