Acer 5552g corrupted bios

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Razeh

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May 28, 2012
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Hello.

Excuse me if I'm posting in the wrong section but I'm in need of help and I'm not sure what to do anymore.

My Acer 5552g laptop died yesterday. It doesn't show anything on the screen and only one led is lighting up: the one that has a little lightbulb icon above. The cooling fan starts for a few seconds but then it goes into idle. I haven't done anything special with the laptop prior to it malfunctioning. I've just shut it down (it told me that some background software needs to be closed first but I was in a hurry and clicked the force shutdown button) and the next day, when I tried to turn it on it started behaving like I mentioned.

I suspect it might be a corrupted BIOS problem even tho I haven't tried installing a new version of BIOS on it. I have tried the recovery mode technique which involves pressing FN and Esc and then powering it on while having a BIOS.fd file on an USB stick but that didn't work. Today I have disassembled it in order to find and take out the CMOS battery but I am not able to locate it.

I have attached some pictures of the motherboard. Maybe you can help me find the CMOS battery. Or suggest a solution.

Thank you very much!

2ypf3sw.jpg

29yqvk6.jpg
 
Do you actually need to take the battery out?
You might be able to just short the CMOS battery contact points to reset the BIOS to default settings.
What does the manual call for you to do?
 
Does it seem your laptop is actually booting up, apart from the blank screen?

If so your LCD backlight might have failed.

If you hold the screen close to a bright light or shine a flashlight on it - can you make out faint images?
 

Razeh

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I'm not sure I know how to short up the CMOS battery contact ports. Also I have no idea where the battery is on the MB.

The LCD doesn't light up at all. Also... there are no sounds coming out of the laptop so I doubt it's an LCD failure since I never had any problems with it. On a previous HP laptop the LCD malfunctioned but the problem slowly progressed.
 

Razeh

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Didn't see your first reply. It looked like a battery but as I haven't seen many MB's in my life, I decided to not tinker with it before asking for some advice. Also... in the service manual it shows a picture with a removable battery.
 

Razeh

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Here is a screenshot from the service manual.
2d0f6v4.png


Also there's some info about how to instal a new BIOS by using a special recovery method. While the laptop is unplugged it tells me to press Fn+Esc and then plug it in and turn it on. Also before turning it on I should have an USB stick with the BIOS file on it. In my case, the name should be BIOS.fd. I have tried that but it didn't work.
 

Razeh

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May 28, 2012
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Here's the step by step recovery method I have tried using various forums for tips about how to do it. I tried different names for the FD file as well as making a smaller partition on my USB stick since some recommend using a storage device that has less than 2 gig's. I wasn't able to write the file on a CD since I'm using a netbook now.

25fq9ah.png
 

That LED light pattern might very well be a diagnostic code explaining what the problem might be.

Does your manual have a section on troubleshooting / diagnostic codes?
 
Usually, when you force a shut down like this (when you shouldn't) the only thing at risk is your Windows installation being corrupted. It really should not have been an issue with your hardware or firmware (BIOS).

On the other hand your screen not displaying anything is a hardware symptom.

Of course you tried reaching the BIOS using F2 at power on and that failed too?



 
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