im going crazy here,i have tried for 2 day every which way i could think of to get this to work.iv tried different variations of the fist 8 digits of the serial number as well as the way it is written on the sticker and no luck.i dont believe the logic board has been replaced and when i try to do a serial number lookup on the apple web site nothing comes up with my serial number nor does anything come up on any other mac serial number lookup web sites.is there a way i can retrieve the serial number through terminal since this is a cluster node with no graphics card. im pulling my hair out here since i cant get remote install to accept the password.any ideas

thank you for your time and have a nice day

update:iv been able to get in through ssh with the serial number but i still can get in with the server assistant under the gui interface.i am useing 10.6.2 admin tools trying to access a g4 installing 10.5.could this be the problem

Yes.
Try Apple Remote Desktop for connecting to that server, and again, use the first 8 digits.

figured it out, i was trying to use admin tools 10.6 to admin my g4 server installing 10.5