Solution Attached: Combination Meter: The power button didn't work for a while ...

Original post title: That was weird and scary: The power button didn't work for a while: Questions ...

Thank you for any help/advice/knowledge/criticism you may offer.

For about two hours, the power button (and other stuff) on my 2007 Prius didn't work.

Earlier in the day, the title of this post was "Help! My Prius doesn't turn off ...", but, after a couple of hours, the button worked again and I was able to power down my car (this after many, many pushes both soft and hard).

I've now turned it on and off a few times and the car seems to be OK and it's behaving as if it's smiling at me and saying, "What?"

Before my big, giant (a.k.a., hybrid) battery went out and before the "INFO" rocker switch on my steering wheel stopped working, both did some TIA-like behavior before fully stroking out. (My apologies for the analogy, but based on first-hand experience, that's really what those failures resembled.) I'm concerned that I'm seeing that here for these components.

My questions: Does this happen a "lot"? Would the car have turned off if I turned off the smart function (as described on page 34 of the manual)? Is this issue as serious as it seems? Should I dump the car?

For those wanting to know more background on what happened (and with some patience), more blather follows.

This is the first time in 138K miles that the below issues have manifested separately or together.

Other issues that happened at the same time (this morning when the car didn't turn off) were that the:

• Instrument cluster was completely dark except for the check engine light (the dark instrument cluster was what first tipped me off that something was wrong)
  
• Backup camera didn't turn on when I shifted into reverse gear
  
• Phone didn't automatically go to speed dial when I was in motion
  
• Fifth door unlock didn't work; the four doors locked/unlocked using the lock/unlock button on the door, but the hatchback didn't unlock (I was parked and wanting to unload the back before taking it to the dealer and leaving it running in the early bird drop-off area because the sales guys didn't know what to do as the service departments at my local [Phoenix] dealerships are all closed today in observance of Memorial Day) (Holy run-on sentence, Batman!)

A day or so ago, the check engine light came on and is throwing a "P0420" code (I posted about this separately yesterday).

By the way, I found out that if you hold down the power button for a while, the car goes into a different state of being where the ICE isn't running and the battery shows as completely empty.

This happened during the course of running an errand this morning. It turned on OK to get going (except for the P0420 code) and I went to where I needed to go and turned off the car. It's when I turned it on to go home that I noticed the instrument cluster was dark ... and it didn't turn off.

It did seem to drive correctly and even though I couldn't see what gear it was in it did go forward and reverse and park when I moved the electronic shift lever.

Additional, perhaps superfluous details:

• I replaced the big, giant battery on JAN 26 2015 (about 6K miles ago)
• The car doesn't appear to be burning any (or much) oil since the level on the dip stick is only marginally below the top dimple and its been about 3K miles since my last oil change

Thank you!

 

Thank you so much for the information.

I did call the dealer to ask what to do to turn off the car and the (sales people) didn't know what to do and didn't seem to have heard of this before.

Is this a well-known issue? Is there some documentation somewhere on this and the mandated dealer response?

My wife said to Google this issue. I'll post if I find anything.

 

Thank you, John!

Also, my wife's advice resulted in me finding a related file.

Both are attached to this post.