Solved! Acer Aspire One D250 Battery/BIOS Issue

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Right, so...

My problem is this: when both the battery and power adapter are plugged in to my netbook (Acer Aspire One D250), the battery charging light blinks orange, the power button turns orange, and the charging starts and stops in time with the blinks.

What I've tried so far (with no luck):
-Removing battery and running it for a while with only the wall adapter, then adding the battery. This worked once, then subsequent times it did nothing to help.
-Updating the BIOS. The current BIOS is version 1.03, and I have tried updating it to 1.27, 1.25, and 1.15. I believe I followed the procedure correctly, doing the following in each case:
Something went wrong with your Aspire D250 BIOS? Download the latest BIOS from support.acer.com and follow these instructions:

1. First format an USB stick with FAT, if this option is not available use a smaller USB stick (eg 1Gig)
2. Download the latest BIOS, and put both FLASHIT.EXE and the BIOS file in the root directory of the stick. Do NOT rename the BIOS file, it should be KAV60.fd
3. Now connect the USB stick to the AA1
Turn the AA1 off, DISCONNECT the battery but leaving the AC adapter connected. Press Fn+Esc, keep it pressed and press the power button to turn the AA1 on. Release Fn+Esc after a few seconds. Press power button if it begins to blink, otherwise do nothing. The AA1 will now initiate the BIOS flash, do not interrupt it under any circumstances. The AA1 will reboot shortly after. Wait patiently.
4. The BIOS has been flashed and all settings reset to default.

Source: http://gadgetmix.com/index/acer-aspire-d250-bios-recovery/

Every attempt at this, using different BIOS versions/flash drives each time had the same result. I would hold the fn and esc keys as it booted up, and although it would display something different from the Acer logo it would start up as normal.

My only idea about why this might not be working is my operating system. I just started using Moblin 2.1 (switching from windows xp), and what makes me think it could be interfering is that most of the time I start up while holding the keys which should flash the BIOS, it instead shows the grub bootloader. Also, I never had any problems with the battery on xp.

So, just a summary of the hardware and software involved:
-Acer Aspire One D250
-BIOS v. 1.03
-Moblin v. 2.1

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!

Edit: Just a clarification. As far as I can tell, the problem isn't with the battery or charger. The computer works fine with either the battery OR the charger cable, but not with both. This is of course a problem, because I have no other way of charging the battery.
 
Solution
I do believe that you are on to something with the OS being the issue at hand. Do you know if this issue specifically started when you moved to Moblin? If you can spare the time, may be try re-installing XP in a dual boot set up to see if the battery will then start to charge. If it does, you know that it is an issue with Moblin. If it doesn't charge, it is probably a bad battery or a bad PSU/AC Adapter.
I do believe that you are on to something with the OS being the issue at hand. Do you know if this issue specifically started when you moved to Moblin? If you can spare the time, may be try re-installing XP in a dual boot set up to see if the battery will then start to charge. If it does, you know that it is an issue with Moblin. If it doesn't charge, it is probably a bad battery or a bad PSU/AC Adapter.
 
Solution
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The issue did begin after the switch to Moblin, but I have also heard of similar things happening with this netbook without an OS change. This is why I would like to try the BIOS update first.

So, my plan now is to remove Moblin and reinstall Windows XP, then do the BIOS update. If that goes as planned I'll put Moblin back on in a dual-boot configuration and hope for the best.
 
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Unfortunately it looks like I'm going to have to send it away. Luckily it's still under warranty, but still...

What happened is the problem progressed to a point where the computer wouldn't even boot up on wall power. This, combined with the fact that I could not charge the battery means that now the battery is out of power, I'm screwed.

So, unless anyone has another idea, I think I have no choice but to send it back to Acer to fix.
 
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i have the same problem..i dont think its due to the change in your os...cause im using windows xp and i face the same problem.. when the ac adapter is charging...the battery icon and the power icon turns orange...i guess its the battery or the ac adapter
 

Betty321

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Jun 6, 2010
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My power icon stays orange even with a full charge. Lately a "full" charge is only 2 hours verses the 3 hours it should be. Netbook is only 8 months old. Acer said for me to go to the BIOS page to reset the battery but I can't find that page. :( I press the F2 key when it starts up but only get a standard setup page, not one with the BIOS. Betty
 

SibTiger

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Need to reset the BIOS password? Here's by far the easiest way:

Open the wifi expansion cover and look for 2 solder pads labeled “RTC(RST)”. Short those pads together (I used a paper clip) while turning it on and your password is now GONE! Woo-hoo!
 

chintzgirl

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Hello,
I'm wondering what you mean by close her up and open her up? Do you mean shut the computer down and the start it up? If you close the computer you can't get to the power button :)
Also, isn't there only one way to put the battery in the computer?

Thanks,
Karen
 

DennyMiniTech

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Nov 27, 2011
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??
 

DennyMiniTech

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The Acer One D250 has an internal battery that powers the RTC (Real Time Clock/Calander) circuit.
"Open her up" probably means take her apart, because the RTC battery (Sanyo ML1220) is soldered onto the motherboard. If this tiny rechargeable fails to keep sufficient voltage due to age, improper firmware drivers (improper bios versions hint, hint) and/or bad support circuitry associated with the bios chip, then the motherboard will act completely dead. A quick fix/test would be to make sure the ML1220 has at least 2 volts, otherwise replace it. The battery can be recharged easily by making a charger from two AAA batteries in series with a 40K ohm resister. Connect the - of the series circuit to the - of the RTC and the resistor between the + RTC and the + of the AAA batteries paired in series. After a minute disconnect the "charger".Use a voltmeter to determine when the RTC battery has charged to near 3 volts. Reassemble netbook and test boot. This is not something to do unless the waranty has expired.A good last resort.