5 beeps on a Dell is usually dead CMOS battery (at least in my experience), so thankfully it’s a cheap thing to replace as a first attempt.
this post was submitted on 25 Jul 2025
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Seconded, I'm guessing OP is having slight datetime problems too. Open it up, new battery, like new. Someone probably gave it away because they didn't know what it meant
It's the "everything's okay" alarm, it goes off every three seconds so you know everything's okay.
what's cool with a dell is you always know it's working normally if it's not on fire
Sounds like a dead BIOS battery. You can confirm it by turning the laptop off and pulling the main battery out. Put it back in, boot the laptop. If the clock has reset, the BIOS battery is dead.
Apart from that, I'd recommend installing AntiX Linux. It's exactly the right kind of OS to get something like that real fast.
Mint XFCE! I'm not giving that any context. Swap the BIOS battery, and you're gold!
Best get Linux in there before the windows updates get cut off.