as the title and my aptly chosen name indicate, I've made a huge ******* mistake.
The background:
I've been having problems for a few days since a powercut garbled a file called ntldr.dll or something... I had to reinstall XP to get that fixed, then the computer wouldnt recognize my ati radeon 9700, attempting to install the drivers ended with an error and an exit from setup, with the explaination: setup doesnt detect the correct hardware or configuration - or something to that effect. Opening the advanced button in the display settings, adapter tab... nothing. Blank page with the titles and all that.
Tried installing catalyst - it said that the hardware profile was incorrect and to set up VGA normally first.
In attempting to do so, I disabled somthing... I cant remember exactly what it was, I think it may have been the blank video adapter.

so now... the machine boots normally - it even shows all the normal bootup screens, right up to the welcome to Winblows and loading pages... then when it should load the desktop

black.

I can mount the HDD in another computer in the house, and edit whatever needs to be editted - if only someone can tell me how to get to the settings, while running under the power and display of the other computer.

Once I have this little problem solved, then I can get back to the videocard issue itself.
Any advice for this complete moron?

I would first try to boot the computer in VGA mode. It is exactly the same as going into safe mode, except you choose VGA mode (keep hitting F8 after you turn the computer on until you see a menu, then choose VGA mode). That will basically not load the display adapter and also drop all the colors/resolution down low. Then use that mode to uninstall the display adapter and reinstall your drivers after booting back into Windows normally.

If you can't even do that, I would try taking the video card out, booting the computer up with no video card, letting it beep, turn the computer off, put card back in, boot safe/VGA mode (hopefully), uninstall video drivers, boot windows, reinstall video drivers

I would install the drivers that came on a CD with your video card if you have them. If not, verify your exact video card model number, and download the newest driver.

Good luck!

okay, tried both suggestions

booting into vga mode does the same thing as regular bootup
booting into safemode has it run all the loading messages as normal, but then it hangs on the last message and never goes to the desktop.

an older agp video that was not being used didnt even work. I have a newer card in this one, but I'm reluctant to think that it is the card - it worked before I disabled anything, it just didnt have a high enough resolution, and wouldnt load the advanced settings.

pulling out the card,restarting without a video card, turning it off, reinstalling and restarting with the card proved to change nothing

in frustration I put XP back in the cd drive... it wont read it or something, it never gives me the press any key to boot from disk.

what can I do??

I tried to go into the bios and change anything, but the bios has options to setup a raid array, and nothing else. I only have two HDDs so there's no point in trying that.
I'm stumped and I'm stuck.
If anyone has any advice, please offer it. In the meantime, I'm pretty frustrated, time to go blow off some steam.

With a lot of motherboards, there is a key you can hit to pick a boot device without going into BIOS (usually F12 from what I've seen). I find it hard to believe there isn't a setting in your BIOS to choose a startup device. If both VGA mode and safe mode don't work on either video card that you are for sure work in other machines, then I would suspect there is a possible problem with your motherboard.

The last thing I would try software-wise is thorough virus/spyware removal and a repair install of XP. So basically to do that, you need to get your unit to boot from your cd/dvd drive. If that doesn't work, then I'm betting a problem on the motherboard.

Good luck

considering that this all started due to an unexpected power failure, I'm inclined to believe that there may be a problem with the board. - however, before I disabled the video adapter or whatever I disabled, it was working and had decent resolution, it just had a **** refresh rate and wouldnt give me resolution settings that were big enough to utilize my entire monitor.

well, had to reinstall windows and lost everything that was on that partition, plus now I have to deal with the annoying task of re-installing everything.

the Moral of the story:
Dont disable display adapters.
(alternatively, dont be a Dumass)