It doesn’t turn on when connected to the computer. It just shows “connected” and lets you see the files on the computer. That’s normal behavior.
You can try pulling the plug partway out of the Fuze, because the charging pins are slightly longer than the data pins–that is, you might be able to make a power connection without the computer knowing it’s connected. But it’s tricky.
But it sounds like the main issue is that the battery is either burned out after two many charging cycles or has gotten disconnected. Open the back, look inside, see if there’s any obvious disconnection. Unfortunately, the Fuze battery isn’t made to be replaced by the user–it’s soldered in. So unless you know what you’re doing with electronics, and can find a good replacement battery somewhere, the end of the battery is probably the end of the Fuze. This non-replaceable battery business is something SanDisk learned from iPod, sad to say.
