MY OLPC DIED!

[Sgt_Nick_Fury]

My friend got an OLPC early on with first buy one get one program. He sorta never used it much, and gave it to me for a birthday gift since I had admired it. Anyway I loved using it as my favorite ereader, to read books at bedtime, I could lower brightness and not disturb wife.

I was reading it, not doing ANYTHING taxing, in tablet mode, when it just shut off. I figured the battery had just gone out.....so I plugged it in wall to charge....but no light. Nothing will happen now i have tried to plug it in multiple times, but no light comes on nothing for charging and I can not get it to come on at all.........I didn't drop it, or anything I was just reading......Any ideas?

I Miss my XO.... But I can't really afford to take it to be fixed.

[ncarrol]

No lights is not promising.

Only thing to try in such case is to remove battery, wait, and reinstall battery. This resets the radio which might hang and lock up system.

There are XO community repairs centers where low cost repairs can be obtained --- do you live near one:

See:

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Category:Community_repair

This is an index of repair topics. Look at repair centers.

One other possibility: If you have a computer from 2007, there was a problem related to the internal (watch style) clock battery. There was combination of an out of spec battery holder and a bug in the firmware. The battery could be jarred out of the holder. Even if the battery was replaced, the firmware would wait for the clock to roll over and XO was effectively "bricked" --- no lights -- not power up.

This required a special connection to the internal serial port to advance the clock. It was also possible to wait a month for the clock to roll over.

Some of the repair centers can easily correct this problem. Later versions of firmware eliminated this bug.

[Sgt_Nick_Fury]

Yeah it' 2007 I think...he had it awhile. It was very first buy one get one deal when he got one I think. But the first thing I did when I got it was do a complete clean install upgrade of latest os and firmware. does that mean if battery fell out I coul put it back in? where is the clock battery located?

In any case if repairs must be done likely I'll have to figure it out. there is NO service center near me in Tennessee. I feel very comfortable working on desktops... never worked on a laptop before though.

[ncarrol]

If you have done a clean install, the bug is long gone. The clean install would have replaced the firmware. Stlll, seems unlikely that the battery would have fallen out after all this time.

Best bet is to phone one of the repair centers -- they can be helpful.

The clock battery is located under the panel with the X and dot on it (outside panel of display section).
It is about one inch in and one inch down from the left speaker.

The panel is held by just four screws. The bad news is that you have to get at the screws from the front. See the above link for disassembly instructions. Also do a search on OLPCNEWS.com/forum -- there are videos somewhere.

The essentials are the following.

Remove the green trims below the rabbit ears. This is held by one screw on the lower edge of the display section (turn the display 90 degrees so you can access the screw through the handle holes). The green trim slides up about 1/8 inch to clear tabs and remove.

The next screw (one on both ends) holds the bezel trim for the display in place -- remove. Bow the bezel up enough at the lower edge to clear the switches and slide down to remove.

The display blocks the screws, but you do not have to completely remove the display. The cushioned screws (4) holding the display down can be removed and the display repositioned slightly to clear access to the screws for the back panel. The back panel screws are about 1 to 1 1/2 inches from each corner of the XO. The one at the power switch corner is further in -- about two inches from the right edge of the XO.

A special note: the ribbon cable connector for the display at the mother board is special and can be easily broken if you are unfamiliar with its type and try to remove the ribbon (it is a flip handle type). That is why I do not suggest removing the display.

The only special note about reassembly is that the bezel slides under the green trim at the top while the bottom is bowed to clear the switches. Just after the bezel clears the switches, it must be unbowed, so retaining tabs will slide into their holes near the lower corners of the display section.

Again, a call to one of the repair centers is your best bet -- I just can't see the battery falling out after a year, especially while you are reading.

Battery type: Panasonic ML1220