Hey everybody,
New to this group and I'm hoping somebody can help me out. On Friday my X5 inexplicably began not responding to the power button to turn on. It turns off just fine but won't turn back on without doing a soft reset.
The help desk at Dell thinks it's an ActiveSync issue but was no help beyond that. I've tried a hard reset to no avail, removed the batteries, etc. Nothing works. About six months ago I upgraded to the Pocket PC 2003 operating system, but have since lost that software, as well as the original Pocket PC 2002 software. Dell suggested I might try re-intalling the software.
Any ideas?
Thanks in advance,
Mark

Mark,

I had a similar, if not the same problem. My problem was that I had the Axim set to turn off after three minutes of inactivity (in Power Settings) and once it turned off, it would not turn on without a soft reset. Also, at times, if I manually turned off the Axim, it would not turn back on unless I did a soft reset. I researched this on the Internet and there was advice about the SD card possibly causing the problem, ActiveSync possibly causing the problem, etc. After ruling all that out, I did a hard reset of the Axim and that seems to have fixed the problem. I've been running for a couple of days now. To do a hard reset, press and hold the power button, then simultaneously press the reset button and hold it for several seconds. A hard reset restored the Axim to its original state. All your data will be erased, and any software you downloaded to it will also need to be reinstalled. Hope this helps you.

Tom

Tom,
I thought I had done a hard reset in addition to the soft reset and it still didn't help. But now that I think about it I couldn't have done a hard reset because all of the programs that I had added were still there. Okay I'll try the hard reset again.
Thanks,
Mark

Mark,

Unfortunately my Axim is now experiencing the same problems again. It ran OK for a couple of days, now it is back to the same problem. So I hope you didn't needlessly reset your device. I guess at some point you would have had to try that anyway (I hope).

I think my last attempt is going to be to revert back to the Pocket PC 2002 Operating System that came with my Axim. That is, unless it won't allow me to downgrade from Pocket PC 2003. It does seem that I saw flaky behavior from this thing since I upgraded. At least that will help me rule out the OS. I'll keep you posted on what I learn.

Tom

Mark,

I've tried something else that seems to be working, although it has only been 2 hours since I tried this. I'll keep testing it over the weekend.

If you are running Pocket PC 2003, there is a patch for the Compact Flash driver that carries a criticality of "Urgent". Here is what Dell says about the patch:
"Urgent Dell highly recommends applying this update as soon as possible. The update contains changes to improve the reliability and availability of your Dell system."

I don't have a compact flash card in my Axim, but I believe the issue exists with the driver itself, whether or not you have a CF card. I installed this and a few other patches available on the Dell website and things are working fine so far.

To find the patch, go here:
Drivers & Downloads

Then click on the + next to System Utilities, then Axim X5 CF Driver Update.

Like a said, I applied a few other patches. They were available from this site and are the Switcher Bar patch, the Audio Driver Update Patch and the Fold-able Keyboard patch (I have a foldable keyboard).

Again, I'm not sure if this will solve the problem but so far the signs are good. Wanted you to have the info in case you wanted to try this now.

By the way, when I click on the About Icon under Settings, my version of the Operating system reports itself as:
Microsoft Pocket PC
Version 4.20.1081 (Build 13100).

I'm definitely running Pocket PC 2003 as I tried to reinstall it, and it told me that 2003 was already installed.

Tom

Mark,

I consider my Axim problem fixed per my last post. It ran all weekend and is working today. Suggest you give the patches a try.

Tom

My axim x5 used to freeze up like that when too many applications were running when I shut the axim off. (Long Shot).