Request - Remove AlienFusion from Command Center

Question

Dell Engineering, Please consider removing AlienFusion from CommandCenter. It causes problems on systems. At least, make it optional or give users an easy way to turn it off or disable it. Version: 2.5.52.0, A08 Why: 1. First of all, it is redundant. Unlike ThermalControls and AlienFX, it has no unique purpose. 2. All these settings are available inside Windows-7 Power Plan Settings. Win-7 does a fine job of setting the defaults (per. desktop or laptop) and gives users a proper way to modify them. 3. It causes problems. It seems to install it's own service. When it has problems, the machine hangs solid for 60 seconds with the HDD light on steady (but very little processor activity) ... this happens every 5 minutes, over and over. The following errors are generated in the Event Viewer (during each hang): Event 7009, Service Control Manager: A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds) while waiting for the Alienware Fusion Service service to connect.Event 7000, Service Control Manager: The Alienware Fusion Service service failed to start due to the following error: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion. This failure occured on a lean install with only Win-7 64bit Ultimate (AW OEM) installed and Microsoft Security Essentials. All Microsoft Updates applied. MSE was not blocking anything and disabling real-time scanning was attempted. A full CC A08 uninstall, reboot, reinstall, reboot was tried several times. While trouble-shooting I went into each of the 3 sub-apps to make sure everything looked ok. It wasn't until I went into AlienFusion and make a minor change to the HighPerformance Profile (so that Apply was allowed) that the system started working properly. This Win-7 was previously working fine. A recent Windows Update might have prompted the failure ... but the first CC re-install should have fixed it. While I had the system previously set to High Performance, I'm wondering if your CC A08 installer changes that. Now that I know what is causing the hang, I'm pretty sure I can disable the Service next time if I need to, but other users might need an easier way. I have seen this hanging behavior before ... on a new fresh install of Win-7 64bit Ultimate (Black AW OEM Disc) and well as a Retail Copy. That is why, when you do a fresh install, and the system comes up and you are trying to install the basic drivers (in the order you recommend) the system hangs every 5 minutes until you get the Command Center installed and configured. Since it also happens with the retail copy, my best guess is that the 'G2 Desktop' Device plays a part. The whole Alien Technolgy theme and mystery is fun and all, until the problems start ... then we just want working performance machines.

DELL-Chris M · Answer

They are looking into this.

DELL-Chris M · Answer

and the minor changes you referred to when modifying the high performance profile?

Tesla1856 · Answer

What were the minor changes you referred to when modifying the high performance profile?  I changed: Display Dim = 0 minsDisplay Off = 10 mins.... then clicked Apply.

Tesla1856 · Answer

Thanks for forwarding my request and/or bug report to the proper team.

It should be noted that this testing was done on my dual-boot partition ... so it really is isolated and as clean and lean as I stated. Only the (current versions) of the following were loaded:

Alienware Aurora X-58 (BIOS A09)
Windows-7 Ultimate - 64bit (Dell/AW OEM - Black disc)
Only support.Dell.com validated drivers for my Service-Tag (loaded in recommended order)
Command Center: v 2.5.52.0 - A08
Windows Updates - Critical, Important, and Recommended thru 9-5-2010
Microsoft Security Essentials

AuroraGuy · Answer

I agree this was causing major issues on my Aurora, I was getting restarts constantly while gaming etc my event viewer had the exact same messages as tesla1856 reported obviously the event number was different but the same thing :

Event 7009, Service Control Manager: A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds) while waiting for the Alienware Fusion Service service to connect.
Event 7000, Service Control Manager: The Alienware Fusion Service service failed to start due to the following error: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion

Since i turned this off my pc has only restarted twice in a month still not really impressed it restarted twice but its alot better then 5 times a day. It was driving me crazy.

I did post a thread about the restarts i was having at first i thought it was a heat issue but then i saw these messages were in event viewer not sure if anyone like chris or any1 else from dell saw the post

Heres the thread , with Tesla1856's help pointing me towards event viewer i worked out what was causing it .....

http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/t/19341816.aspx

AuroraGuy · Answer

yeh mate  in task manager / services       Alien fusion service   is just on stopped    it never runs if i have it on  it causes crashes

Tesla1856 · Answer

Since i turned this off my pc has only restarted twice in a month still not really impressed it restarted twice but its alot better then 5 times a day

You manually Disabled the Service? (and it stayed Disabled)

morblore · Answer

I never had issues with mine. It is about the only part of Command center I dont have issues with. But anyway I still disable mine because its redundant and it's one less service to have running.

Hat-Trick · Answer

So should I go in the control panel/services and disable it from there for good or just disable it under processes every time windows loads? :)

WarhammerTX · Answer

I just uninstalled it I couldnt get  fx working in it anyway I like the lights but wouldnt set the side panels to the color I wanted without booting the system twice  I dont overclock anyway.

ogreb · Answer

I also just got rid of it...just didn't reinstall it on reformat.

Thermal control is a joke since the only fan control options are the HD fan and the tiny pci fan that hangs over the ram.

The lighting system was cool for like a week..now I could care less.

Also got rid of Dell Data safe and tons of other Dell bloat...

My Aurora is a little screamer now..

Tesla1856 · Answer

I also just got rid of it...just didn't reinstall it on reformat.

Interesting. Whenever I load Win7-64 (either Dell or Retail) fresh onto my dual-boot partition, it exhibits the above described hanging until I install CC. I now believe that disabling the AlienFusion service is another fix (but haven't tried it yet ... with the whole fresh install procedure).

Good to know it worked for you.

AuroraGuy · Answer

@ Hat-Trick go to start bar type services in search bar then open it. Sort them by name find alien fusion service right click go to stop , when u've done that right click again go to properties then change start up type, change it from automatic to manual then it won't start up unless you tell it too.

Tesla1856 · Answer

Here's another user with the same problem: alienfusionservice.exe

Spamfighter · Answer

Is this still a problem?   I had those 7000 and 7009 events on my original and on the replacement PC and complained to AW support as on the original PC those events seem to co-incide with lots of blue screens - they totally ignored it.  But after updating CC to 2.6 and the associated firmware to the MIO board, I never had those again.  Perhaps Telsa's report to Engeneering made them fix it. in 2.6

Locked Topics – Alienware General

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