My friend Tom gave me a Duo 230, a Duo 250, a Duo Dock, and an Apple Portrait Display! We spent some time playing around with the Duos, but ran into a strange problem we couldn't figure out. When inserted into the Dock, both Duos will turn off mid-way through booting, after the "Welcome to Macintosh" message appears. xx(
If you try booting with extensions off, the Duo 250 will boot successfully and runs normally, but the Duo 230 still shuts down after Welcome to Macintosh appears.
Our first thought was that this could be a dead PRAM battery issue, so we removed the keyboard from both Duos, and disconnected the PRAM battery cable that's above-right of the trackball. That didn't seem to make any difference, however - the shutdown during booting still happened the same as before.
As far as we can tell, this behavior is specific to running with the Duo in the Dock. Unfortunately both Duo batteries are dead, and I don't have an AC adapter, so I don't have any way to try running them outside the Dock.
The hard drive built into the Dock is dead, so we disconnected it. Could that have anything to do with the problem?
Could this be a software issue? The fact that 250 will boot with extensions off suggests it might be, but what kind of software problem would cause the computer to turn off halfway through booting? And why doesn't the 230 boot even with extensions off?
If you try booting with extensions off, the Duo 250 will boot successfully and runs normally, but the Duo 230 still shuts down after Welcome to Macintosh appears.
Our first thought was that this could be a dead PRAM battery issue, so we removed the keyboard from both Duos, and disconnected the PRAM battery cable that's above-right of the trackball. That didn't seem to make any difference, however - the shutdown during booting still happened the same as before.
As far as we can tell, this behavior is specific to running with the Duo in the Dock. Unfortunately both Duo batteries are dead, and I don't have an AC adapter, so I don't have any way to try running them outside the Dock.
The hard drive built into the Dock is dead, so we disconnected it. Could that have anything to do with the problem?
Could this be a software issue? The fact that 250 will boot with extensions off suggests it might be, but what kind of software problem would cause the computer to turn off halfway through booting? And why doesn't the 230 boot even with extensions off?
) 
I put about 200 mAh into the battery, after which its voltage had risen to about 14.5V. The battery was then recognized in the Duo when I had it in the dock, so that charged it some more until it said it was full. The "full" battery only powered the Duo 230 for about 15 minutes, but at least it worked.
