Error message: No IDE Hard Drives installed.... suggestions?

Hi all,

I have a Dimension 8200.  A couple of day's ago it stopped working.  On power up, the following message appears:

"strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setup utility"

I tried CTRL-ALT-D.  The following message appeared:

"IDE Drive Diagnostics running, please wait....

Primary IDE

  Drive 0:  No IDE device

  Drive 1:  No IDE device

Secondary IDE

  Drive 0:  No IDE device

  Drive 1:  No IDE device

No IDE hard drives installed, press any key to continue"

An IT guy at work said it sounds like my IDE controller is shot.  So, my questions are:

1)  How can I verify whether the IDE controller is functioning or not?

2)  In the Dimension 8200, is the IDE controller built into the mother board?

3)  Can I install an IDE card and by-pass the original controller (assuming the IDE controller is built into the motherboard)

4)  Any other helpful suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.