dead battery - help with non functioning gauges

[uwmjs]

So, yesterday I was absent minded and left my lights on at work, my battery was completely drained. Someone from my office was nice enough to jump me, but after I got the jump and drove away I noticed that my Tach, gas gauge, OBC, and gear indicator were non-functioning. In addition to this, my climate control now displays in celsius. All the other electronics seem to be functioning fine, including the stereo. I thought I may just need to restart the car for it to reset itself, but when I started it up this morning I had the same problem. Also, I noticed that there's a really faint message that appears in german on the OBC... I could only see it in direct sunlight because there was no backlight, but it said "gurt anlegen" (fasten seatbelt)

Any ideas on a quick fix for this? Or do I need to take it into the dealer?

-Mike

[grassypond]

This exact same thing happened to me last week. I was out of town visiting family with a totally drained battery. I jumped the X as advised. I decided to go on to a dealer for help. There was no function display, Nav was in German and temp was Celsius. I even called for navigation with the voice module......and got German instructions back.

My X5 is an '01 4.4 w/nav and retro-fit BT

The dealer reprogrammed the truck, suggesting that I had jumped it incorrectly.....for which he was promptly scolded. He load tested the battery and said I was fine...no new battery. In fact everything worked fine and still works fine......I guess just a gremlin. The dealer gave me no information on what he thought happened....except that I jumped the truck incorrectly. Oh, he was nice enough not to charge me and got me in and out of the shop reasonably well....about 90 minutes.

[SCX5]

... leaving it like that a few hours. When you reconnect it, there is a chance the systems will have ctrl-alt-deleted themselves.

If this doesn't work, it probably needs to be reprogrammed by the dealer.

[ydoc]

A fix --

Disconnect the battery and re-connect. It works like a reboot of the computer.

The gauges should return to normal functioning.

[ydoc]

I had the same symptoms as Mike and disconnecting the battery worked like a charm. The German seatbelt warning went away, temp gauges back to Farenheit, OBC display back, and tach and gas gauges are working.

[robertplattbell]

Even jumping the car "correctly" can cause all sorts of voltage spikes and surges, not to mention the effect of low voltage (10.5 V or less) on the computer as the battery dies.

Computers can do very odd things when the power supply voltage is out of range.

When I replaced my battery, I didn't have this problem, but the traction control light went on for about 5 miles.

Reboot and start over.