I love you, man!
I pulled the card that had the video plug, moved the other down to that slot, and turned it on. PC booted up, no crazy distortion (that horizontal line is still there.... cable or monitor?). Driver seems to be recent, 3/14/13. 6.14.13.1422 (why can't they name these things sanely?
I am going to see how this works for a while, and may get a new SSD HD
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Exclus.../dp/B00B2X312S
then add it as the primary and move the old one to slave.