Hello,  I bought an "as is" sansa to save money on ebay, the problem is that when you try to turn it on it says "key locked system shutting down" I though I could fix it because I read up on it and it said all I had to do was turn off the hold switch, but when I try to turn it on with the hold switch off it just flashes the startup screen forever. Also I tried taking it apart to see if the hold button was short circuted or something but I couldn't get that deep into it because a IC chip is in the way.

if its from ebay - it might have a dead battery. Can you try to power it on while it is connected to USB?

(in reply to killalot57)

Thanks for the advice but I finally fixed it, just for reference the information that helped me is the following...


Hello,

Thank you for contacting SanDisk Technical Support. It is our goal to make sure that you have all the resources that you need to make the most out of your product.

I understand your concern and rest assured that I will do my very best in resolving this issue.

Please respond to this message including answers to the following questions so that we can work to isolate and resolve your issue:

- What is the operating system of your computer (e.g. Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows Vista Home Basic, Mac OS 10, etc.)?
- What is your computer's make and model? Is it a laptop or a desktop?

This may be caused when there is a corruption in the system of the Sansa.

If your player is frozen or will not power on/off, try the "Soft Reset" first by pressing and holding the "Power/Menu" button for about 20 seconds. Press the button once again to see if the player will power on.

If it still fails, we may need to format the player and perform a manual re-installation of the firmware to over-write system errors that an automatic firmware update may not fix. Formatting will erase all data from the player. Please back up all data before proceeding.

1. Open the "My Computer" (Windows XP) / "Computer" (Windows Vista) window. To perform "Recovery Mode", make sure that the player is off and the Hold switch is enabled (slide the HOLD switch towards the right until orange is showing) then press and hold the "Record" button while connecting the device to your computer. Wait until a "16MB-FORMAT" icon appears in the "My Computer" / "Computer" window, and then release the Record button.

2. Click on the link for the Standard e200 Firmware and download it to your desktop or you could copy and paste the link below on the address bar of your Internet browser and hit Enter:

http://mp3support.sandisk.com/firmware/e200/e200v101.02.24a.zip

3. Right-click on the file you just downloaded and select "Open with" > "Compressed Folder". Drag and drop or copy and paste the files into the "16MB-FORMAT" drive.

4. In the "16MB-FORMAT" drive window, select the "File" menu and select "New" > "Folder" and rename the folder as sansa.fmt then press Enter to save. You should now have the version.txt file, the sansa.fmt folder and the files you added you earlier inside that drive.

5. Move the Hold switch back to the left to where white is showing. Disconnect the player and look at the screen. Verify if it is formatting and resetting. Once it finally finishes doing its update, you may need to restart it and choose your language.
Check if you are now able to use your player.

For verification purposes, kindly provide the following information:

- Your first and last name
- Your device's date of purchase (mm/dd/yyyy)
- Your device's place of purchase
- Verify if the device is refurbished (Check if it has an "R" or "refurb" sticker)

Should you have further concerns, please reply to this e-mail or send a support request to support@sandisk.com.

Thank you for contacting SanDisk Technical Support. Have a great day.

Best regards,
Carmel F.
SanDisk Technical Support

(in reply to dejerezz)