Acer Aspire 3 A315-55G-5851 won't boot after changing some hidden advanced settings in BIOS

elmonitis
elmonitis Member Posts: 10

Tinkerer
in Aspire Laptops
First of all, I admit to having been stupid, which brought me into this predicament in the first place.  I thought I understood what I was doing, but I was apparently wrong.  Still, I'm hoping someone here would be forgiving and kind enough to help me out of this hole.

Wanting to use the NVIDIA graphics card instead of the internal graphics card on my Acer Aspire 3 A315-55G-5851, I fiddled with a setting or two (I think it was Primary Display, and maybe Internal Graphics) in the hidden Advanced settings of the BIOS.  Here's a screenshot of the settings page before I made the changes (Unfortunately, I forgot to screenshot the changes): 



I saved the changes and rebooted, only to find out that I couldn't boot into anything anymore, not even the BIOS itself.  Before this, I was still able to boot normally into Ubuntu, so the cause of the problem must have been the changes that I made to the BIOS.  Problem is that I could not access even the BIOS anymore.  All I get when I press the Power button is a black screen, but the laptop seems to be booting (although not displaying anything on the screen) because the battery and power indicator LEDs on the right side turn on, and I hear the usual soft whirring sound of the fan.

I tried hooking up the laptop to a monitor via HDMI cable.  Still no display, even after pressing Fn+F5 and Fn+F6 several times and rebooting several times.

I also tried performing a battery reset (i.e., power off laptop, unplug power cable, insert paper clip into Battery Reset hole at the bottom of laptop for 10 seconds, remove paper clip, leave laptop alone for 15 minutes, plug power cable back in, turn on laptop while pressing F2 to access BIOS).  Still nothing.  I also tried pressing the paper clip into the hole for 20 and 30 seconds, but still no dice.

Is there hope for me?  What other things can I try to be able to access my BIOS again and boot into my OS again?  Any advice deeply appreciated.  Thanks in advance.
 




Answers

  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    Press and hold the power button till the machine shuts off. Press and hold the F2 key. While still holding the F2 key, turn the machine on. If you get a BIOS screen within about 5 seconds, press F9 to load BIOS defaults. Then press F10 to save settings. Then the enter key to choose yes & exit.

    If no screen, the blindly do the same key sequence after holding the F2 key .and turning the machine on for about 5 seconds.  

    Jack E/NJ

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    JackE said:
    Press and hold the power button till the machine shuts off. Press and hold the F2 key. While still holding the F2 key, turn the machine on. If you get a BIOS screen within about 5 seconds, press F9 to load BIOS defaults. Then press F10 to save settings. Then the enter key to choose yes & exit.

    If no screen, the blindly do the same key sequence after holding the F2 key .and turning the machine on for about 5 seconds.  
    I got no BIOS screen at all.  So, as suggested, I just pressed the same key sequence.  Tried it several times.  Didn't work.  Not sure what you meant by "and turning the machine on for about 5 seconds" though.
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    After turning the machine on, keep pressing and holding the F2 key for about 5 seconds to make sure the BIOS menu has time to load even if you can't see it.

    Jack E/NJ

  • andalib
    andalib Member Posts: 57 Enthusiast WiFi Icon
    elmonitis said:
    First of all, I admit to having been stupid, which brought me into this predicament in the first place.  I thought I understood what I was doing, but I was apparently wrong.  Still, I'm hoping someone here would be forgiving and kind enough to help me out of this hole.

    Wanting to use the NVIDIA graphics card instead of the internal graphics card on my Acer Aspire 3 A315-55G-5851, I fiddled with a setting or two (I think it was Primary Display, and maybe Internal Graphics) in the hidden Advanced settings of the BIOS.  Here's a screenshot of the settings page before I made the changes (Unfortunately, I forgot to screenshot the changes): 



    I saved the changes and rebooted, only to find out that I couldn't boot into anything anymore, not even the BIOS itself.  Before this, I was still able to boot normally into Ubuntu, so the cause of the problem must have been the changes that I made to the BIOS.  Problem is that I could not access even the BIOS anymore.  All I get when I press the Power button is a black screen, but the laptop seems to be booting (although not displaying anything on the screen) because the battery and power indicator LEDs on the right side turn on, and I hear the usual soft whirring sound of the fan.

    I tried hooking up the laptop to a monitor via HDMI cable.  Still no display, even after pressing Fn+F5 and Fn+F6 several times and rebooting several times.

    I also tried performing a battery reset (i.e., power off laptop, unplug power cable, insert paper clip into Battery Reset hole at the bottom of laptop for 10 seconds, remove paper clip, leave laptop alone for 15 minutes, plug power cable back in, turn on laptop while pressing F2 to access BIOS).  Still nothing.  I also tried pressing the paper clip into the hole for 20 and 30 seconds, but still no dice.

    Is there hope for me?  What other things can I try to be able to access my BIOS again and boot into my OS again?  Any advice deeply appreciated.  Thanks in advance.
     




    Remove cmos battery and replug you shall know that All laptop (mostly) have nvidia optimus force enabled so both Igpu and Dgpu are to be active so dont try to use DGPU only...
  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    JackE said:
    After turning the machine on, keep pressing and holding the F2 key for about 5 seconds to make sure the BIOS menu has time to load even if you can't see it.
    This was what I did (multiple times):  Hold down F2 key while pressing Power button once to turn on laptop.  Keep the F2 key held down for at least 5 seconds.  Press F9 to load defaults.  Press F10 to save settings.  Then press Enter.  Did I do it right?  If I did, it still didn't work.  :-(
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    Remove charge and unplug battery. Then remove RTC coin cell. Then short the  cell's mainboard terminals for about a minute.

    Jack E/NJ

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    andalib said:
    elmonitis said:
    First of all, I admit to having been stupid, which brought me into this predicament in the first place.  I thought I understood what I was doing, but I was apparently wrong.  Still, I'm hoping someone here would be forgiving and kind enough to help me out of this hole.

    Wanting to use the NVIDIA graphics card instead of the internal graphics card on my Acer Aspire 3 A315-55G-5851, I fiddled with a setting or two (I think it was Primary Display, and maybe Internal Graphics) in the hidden Advanced settings of the BIOS.  Here's a screenshot of the settings page before I made the changes (Unfortunately, I forgot to screenshot the changes): 



    I saved the changes and rebooted, only to find out that I couldn't boot into anything anymore, not even the BIOS itself.  Before this, I was still able to boot normally into Ubuntu, so the cause of the problem must have been the changes that I made to the BIOS.  Problem is that I could not access even the BIOS anymore.  All I get when I press the Power button is a black screen, but the laptop seems to be booting (although not displaying anything on the screen) because the battery and power indicator LEDs on the right side turn on, and I hear the usual soft whirring sound of the fan.

    I tried hooking up the laptop to a monitor via HDMI cable.  Still no display, even after pressing Fn+F5 and Fn+F6 several times and rebooting several times.

    I also tried performing a battery reset (i.e., power off laptop, unplug power cable, insert paper clip into Battery Reset hole at the bottom of laptop for 10 seconds, remove paper clip, leave laptop alone for 15 minutes, plug power cable back in, turn on laptop while pressing F2 to access BIOS).  Still nothing.  I also tried pressing the paper clip into the hole for 20 and 30 seconds, but still no dice.

    Is there hope for me?  What other things can I try to be able to access my BIOS again and boot into my OS again?  Any advice deeply appreciated.  Thanks in advance.
     




    Remove cmos battery and replug you shall know that All laptop (mostly) have nvidia optimus force enabled so both Igpu and Dgpu are to be active so dont try to use DGPU only...

    The battery in this model is built in.  I'm not inclined to unscrew anything at this moment because I might do more harm than good.
  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    edited January 2022
    JackE said:
    Remove charge and unplug battery. Then remove RTC coin cell. Then short the  cell's mainboard terminals for about a minute.

     I seriously have very little idea how to do this exactly and safely.  Is the RTC coin cell the same as the CMOS battery that @andalib mentioned?  Is there a newbie's guide somewhere for safely shorting this specific laptop's mainboard terminals?  I'm afraid I might damage some of the internals if I'm not sure about what to do.



  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    No. Remove main battery and unplug the coin cell wire connector from mainboard pins (A). Short pins for about a minute.



    Jack E/NJ

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    JackE said:
    No. Remove main battery and unplug the coin cell wire connector from mainboard pins (A). Short pins for about a minute.



    Hey, @JackE, I'm thankful that you're taking time to help me out.  But, I really have no background in electronics, so most of your instructions sound Greek to me, although I'm desperate about trying them just to save my laptop.  Right now I'm attempting to unscrew the bottom cover.  I'll get back to you and send a photo once I succeed.

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    elmonitis said:
    JackE said:
    No. Remove main battery and unplug the coin cell wire connector from mainboard pins (A). Short pins for about a minute.



    Hey, @JackE, I'm thankful that you're taking time to help me out.  But, I really have no background in electronics, so most of your instructions sound Greek to me, although I'm desperate about trying them just to save my laptop.  Right now I'm attempting to unscrew the bottom cover.  I'll get back to you and send a photo once I succeed.


    Here's what I'm seeing now.  It looks different from the photo that you sent.  Where do I go from here?  What do I do next?  Please give instructions for a layperson. :-)


  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    The image below should be self-explanatory


    Jack E/NJ

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    JackE said:
    The image below should be self-explanatory



    Thank you!  I was able to disconnect the main battery and the RTC coin cell connector from the mainboard.  But, what does it mean to "short the RTC mainboard pins"?  How do I do that?
  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    elmonitis said:
    JackE said:
    The image below should be self-explanatory



    Thank you!  I was able to disconnect the main battery and the RTC coin cell connector from the mainboard.  But, what does it mean to "short the RTC mainboard pins"?  How do I do that?

    Here's what it looks like now.  Did I do the disconnections correctly?  Still stumped about shorting the pins.   No idea how to do that.




  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    Just touch each pin with the blade of a regular flat screwdriver


    Jack E/NJ

  • elmonitis
    elmonitis Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer
    edited January 2022
    JackE said:
    Just touch each pin with the blade of a regular flat screwdriver



    I got impatient last night and went ahead and rebooted after removing the main and RTC batteries for a few minutes.  For some reason, it worked even if I didn't get to short the pins as you advised.  I am now able to access my BIOS and boot into my OS.  Thank you, @JackE, for your patience and for lending your expertise to a distressed noob like me.  Thank you!
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,888 Trailblazer
    Congratulations on your success. Thanks for reporting back.

    Jack E/NJ

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