<p>10 years later from the initiation of this thread for help, I myself have now encountered the same problem with my FE-2, and turned to Google and found this discussion! Thank you all. The problem was in fact dead batteries, and turning the shutter to B or M250 did the trick. </p>
<p>I keep a spare set of batteries on hand (in my refrigerator!) and installed them and all is back to normal. Granted, this moment in time is December 2015, and my spare batteries are from 2006 (already dated by 9 years, but working) ! I can't imagine how old the <em>dead</em> batteries are. I do know that they were working about a few years ago!</p>
<p>Cheers!</p>