The entire time, the problem was actually my alternator--which, by the way, I said was it in the first friggin' place! Guess the sevice guys thought that was just too obvious, so they first replaced the 'battery' instead, then, the final phase resistor switch...finally, the lightswitch must have come on..tada..must be that alternator after all! DUH! My old 525i did the same thing, so I figured this was the case the whole time...uuuugh!

Hope this helps anyone else out there going through the same problems.

PEACE!