Nitro 5 AN515-52 Laptop only turns on when battery reset button is pressed

Hi!

So basically I have an Acer Nitro 5 AN515-52, got a new SSD and swapped it with the old 16GB Intel Optane one, made sure to unplug the battery and everything beforehand, after I installed the new one I pressed the power button and the laptop won't turn on, no light indicating it's charging

I tried everything and while I was trying to reset the battery by putting a needle through the reset pinhole, I saw an orange light that would disappeare 15 seconds after long pressing on the reset, but nothing would happen

I did it again but this time pressed the power button and voila! The laptop turned on!!!

But as soon as I stopped pressing on the battery reset pinhole it turned off, I then unscrewed the whole battery and took it off, laptop still won't boot on charger only unless the battery reset button is pressed, and if I unplug the charger it turns off even if the reset button is pressed... so both the charger has to be plugged in and the battery reset button pressed for the laptop to turn on!

So now I have a needle pressing on the battery reset button at all times for the laptop to boot and stay on, I don't know what to do? Also battery is stuck on %76, and it goes down by 1% every 10 hours, what went wrong this whole time it was fine just the moment I put on a new SSD, what's the problem and what do I do?

{Thread was edited to add model name to the title}

Accepted answers

JackE

SW3 controls all power to the mainboard. It should be a spring-loaded normally-on switch. When depressed with a paperclip through the pinhole, it should turn off. This should cut all power to the mainboard.

From your description, this switch is NOT operating as it should when its button is depressed with your needle. It should turn off, not turn on. Your needle is somehow completing circuit, not interrupting it as it should.

All comments

JackE

Are you still booting from the 2.5" HDD? Did you change SATA mode to AHCI from VMD or iRST with optane?

Unserious

JackE said:

Are you still booting from the 2.5" HDD? Did you change SATA mode to AHCI from VMD or iRST with optane?

I don't have an HDD anymore, it died a few months ago and for a while I was using the Intel Optane 16GB SSD that came with the laptop

Until I got a 1TB Samsung 980 SSD yesterday and swapped it with Intel Optane one, as soon as I installed the new SSD and tried to turn on the laptop it wouldn't boot or show that it's charging, until I found the above trick to get it to turn on.

And yes it's set to AHCI.

JackE

It won't boot because there's no operating system on the SSD. Use Microsoft's USB media creation tool to make a bootable Win10 installation stick. Insert the stick. Then turn the machine on and immediately tap the F12 key. A boot menu should appear to allow you to boot from the USB stick to install Win10 on the new SSD.

Unserious

JackE said:

It won't boot because there's no operating system on the SSD. Use Microsoft's USB media creation tool to make a bootable Win10 installation stick. Insert the stick. Then turn the machine on and immediately tap the F12 key. A boot menu should appear to allow you to boot from the USB stick to install Win10 on the new SSD.

No that's what I'm saying, I got it to boot, I installed window 10 on the new SSD, downloadrd all drivers and even upgraded to windows 11..... but I had to do all of that while there's a needle pressing on the battery reset pinhole

I don't know how to explain this in a simpler way but basically:

battery reset button pressed at all time = only way for the laptop to boot or turn on

without pressing on it the laptop is basically dead, so now I have a needle that I taped to the back cover to make sure it's pressed at all times

JackE

>>>while there's a needle pressing on the battery reset pinhole >>>battery reset button pressed at all time = only way for the laptop to boot or turn on>>>

Sounds like the reset switch return spring broke. I suspect the needle has likely pierced the switch's inside and is making contact between the switch's two points. The bottom cover needs to be removed and the switch SW3 examined. Since the switch is thru-hole soldered to the mainboard, possibly the easiest & safest farmer's fix is to bridge the gap between the points inside the case with a short piece of copper and tape. Or break the switch off the mainboard and bridge the gap between the two contacts on the mainboard with a dab of solder.

Unserious

JackE said:

>>>while there's a needle pressing on the battery reset pinhole >>>battery reset button pressed at all time = only way for the laptop to boot or turn on>>>

Sounds like the reset switch return spring broke. I suspect the needle has likely pierced the switch's inside and is making contact between the switch's two points. The bottom cover needs to be removed and the switch SW3 examined. Since the switch is thru-hole soldered to the mainboard, possibly the easiest & safest farmer's fix is to bridge the gap between the points inside the case with a short piece of copper and tape. Or break the switch off the mainboard and bridge the gap between the two contacts on the mainboard with a dab of solder.

I honestly doubt the needle pierced through the SW3 switch as there's no visible damage to it, but also this whole problem occurred before I even used a needle, I pressed on it with my finger at the start

All I wanna know is why is it that the laptop can only boot when the SW3 is pressed? It has nothing to do with the power button it's only a battery reset button, I don't understand why it needs to be pressed now all of the sudden when I switched SSDs, I took off the whole motherboard, checked all wired and tried cleaning it, and still the same,

and why's the battery stuck at 75% for 4 days now? And the orange charging light won't stop blinking, I don't think it's even running on battery cause as soon as I unplug the charger it shuts off

I'm starting to give up on this as I can't even know what's causing this issue, I seem to be the obly one that has it🤦🏻‍♂️

JackE

SW3 controls all power to the mainboard. It should be a spring-loaded normally-on switch. When depressed with a paperclip through the pinhole, it should turn off. This should cut all power to the mainboard.

From your description, this switch is NOT operating as it should when its button is depressed with your needle. It should turn off, not turn on. Your needle is somehow completing circuit, not interrupting it as it should.

Unserious

JackE said:

SW3 controls all power to the mainboard. It should be a spring-loaded normally-on switch. When depressed with a paperclip through the pinhole, it should turn off. This should cut all power to the mainboard.

From your description, this switch is NOT operating as it should when its button is depressed with your needle. It should turn off, not turn on. Your needle is somehow completing circuit, not interrupting it as it should.

What do you think caused it as I never touched the switch, only swapped to the news SSD, there's a couple of scratches on the mobo though, do you think that's what causing it? And do I need to replace the mobo? Cause I couldn't understand what to "bridge the gap between he two points" meant

JackE

>>>What do you think caused it as I never touched the switch, only swapped to the news SSD, there's a couple of scratches on the mobo though, do you think that's what causing it?>>>

The SW3 should have two solder contacts or points on the mainboard. In order to power the mainboard, the gap between these two soldered points must be bridged or shorted together. If the spring-loaded normally on switch is working properly, these two points are bridged or shorted together inside the switch body when the button is NOT pressed.

If the scratches are near these two solder points, I'm going to guess that the needle was bridging or shorting the gap between these two points. That's why the needle was keeping the laptop on. I'm not sure what happen to the switch SW3. But it is definitely not working like it should.

The switch should be replaceable with a pencil tip soldering tool. Or it can be permanently eliminated and the two contacts can be soldered together to make contact. Not ideal, but can be made to work and much better than relying on a needle to keep the laptop turned on.

Unserious

JackE said:

>>>What do you think caused it as I never touched the switch, only swapped to the news SSD, there's a couple of scratches on the mobo though, do you think that's what causing it?>>>

The SW3 should have two solder contacts or points on the mainboard. In order to power the mainboard, the gap between these two soldered points must be bridged or shorted together. If the spring-loaded normally on switch is working properly, these two points are bridged or shorted together inside the switch body when the button is NOT pressed.

If the scratches are near these two solder points, I'm going to guess that the needle was bridging or shorting the gap between these two points. That's why the needle was keeping the laptop on. I'm not sure what happen to the switch SW3. But it is definitely not working like it should.

The switch should be replaceable with a pencil tip soldering tool. Or it can be permanently eliminated and the two contacts can be soldered together to make contact. Not ideal, but can be made to work and much better than relying on a needle to keep the laptop turned on.

Thank you!

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