Big cleanup : need help to remove unnecessary preinstalled alienware specific tasks

hi

I recently got an alienware m11x R3 w/ killer network card.

since I got the laptop it's BSOD party.

I didn't install much stuff on it. no strange softs. legal. only stuff I already used before on my previous computers (last one is also a win7 64 bits i7 dell laptop, never had a blue screen once in 2 years of use, and absolutely all the stuff I installed on the m11x were installed on it previously, except deus ex HR) and never had any problem.

I would like this laptop to be configured as a basic windows 7 laptop. I don't need any monitor, update, recovery or whatever task.
I do a few vg but I mostly use the computer for djing. that's why I chose a m11x : high portability yet performant components.

so here is my question : which alienware-specific background task can I safely deactivate ? (thinking about alienrespawn, killer bigfoot monitor, realtek audio utilities, intel graphics control pannel, and all those strange tasks such as AERTSr64, ff_protection, hook32 manager, alienware OSD...). as long as it's not necessary for a regular use I don't need them (except alienFX of course, I love my laptop with psychedelic light show).

btw are there some alienware-typical general purpose tweaks I should do ?

 

You have it sorta backwards. The one thing you can "kill" is the lighting software. Set your prefs how you like and you can stop loading the controller (do not uninstall). This was the only thing I had eating CPU cycles @~10% (R1)

I would chase support on this. It is possible you have some hardware issue that will lead you down the rabbit hole of misdiagnosis. True, disabling some services can help but IF you have hw issue its only a matter of time til you find or stumble into another BSD trigger.

Keep the ff-protection. The others you can disable and test, preferably one at a time.

 

No don't try any of the above except the search button cause this has been covered who knows how many times. Try and find a link between the Killer NIC and your BSOD's.

 

let's take some exemples

apparently ff_protection's purpose is to protect the computer in case of a free fall, using an accelerometer. well, I never carry my computer with power turned on (firstly I don't have any reason to do so and secondly that would be risky : if I drop it with the screen opened I'd break something for sure).

same with alien respawn : factory reset ? I don't need this. I always kept my computers clean. the only cases I had to resinstall the OS were after a HDD failure (respawn or not a dead HDD is dead). and if I REALLY need an OS resinstall I can do it without respawn (unless Dell managed to lock it somehow, which would be lame).

OSD : I don't need this, my eyes and ears are enough to tell if the sound or brightness is good or not, don't need an animated icon.

realtek audio manager : either my computer is plugged via HDMI to my flatscreen or I use a NI audio interface or I use senheiser headphones which means an unprocessed signal is better. doesn't this make it a superfluous task ?

what does the bigfoot killer manager do appart from monitoring ? works the same if I kill the task.

etc, the fact I want to turn these off isn't totally related to the fact I have some BSOD's. i also want the lightest OS possible.

I'm just totally unsure of which is completely safe to be deactivated permanently.

the fact I use the computer for live music is a also reason. I don't want any popup, update, bug or whatever during a performance. (e.g. what if ff_protection gives me false positives during a performance because of heavy sub basses and locks some components or whatever it does when it activates its functions ? I also like to watch movies in planes, what about turbulences ? this is of course expectation, I hope the engineer behind this function thinked of such case, but what if they didn't ?)

 

Well for most of that you will get ZERO benefit so not many will have bothered to remove them all in combo with an R3 in order to be certain.

Since you are convinced these need dealt with the next step to to try. Suggest doing one at a time and test.

If you have THAT much vibration you will have bigger issues to worry about than FF!

In the end you have already decided. What you want to hear is that your decision is the right one but all there is will be opinion. My opinion is you are wasting your time with most of that. Testing fully will tell which ones to keep/drop.

 

I use my M11x for Ableton and I have not done anything to my computer except up the bios overclock on the CPU. I also know quite a bit about computers and disabling the things that you mention is, like GNandGS said, not worth the time. The resources it takes to run all of that is in the range of a few megs of memory and really are there to let you know if something malfunctions, obviously.

I have the R2 and there really is not that much in the way of 'extra' software that was installed. I tried to disable the face recognition software to save some resources only to find out I couldn't connect to my home network due to some integration in explorer.

Long story short, you should be fine out of the box and if you start killing processes you might run into more issues.

The blue screen tends to tell me there is an issue with some hardware and that you should give Dell a call to find out what is causing those issues. I have had 3 blue screens on my laptop over a year and a half and they were all my fault.

 

after some updates (bios, drivers) I even have more BSODs and I'm really starting to worry.

used whocrashed, one crash has apparently been caused by commodo firewall, but the other ones by unspecified drivers.

 

hrrm... commodo. Is that an R3 specific install? I do not recall having that (or removed it).

Stop stressing IMO and give support a ring. You COULD do the diagnostic work for them but if its hardware you will need/want to call them anyway. If its software as the trigger I'm not sure what you can do differently as the their base image will contain all the same programs - unless you adding some things

 

the problem is that I have a gig tomorrow.


I installed commodo myself (needed a firewall...).

it "seems" stable since I finished updating everything.


but now some tools i need for my set aren't working anymore (starting by virtual router).

 

There is a built in firewall on Window 7, you might be having conflicts that are causing the issues. I would remove commodo at least til you are done with your gig.

 

I never activate windows firewall, I prefer 3rd party.

and I always deactivate commodo and the antivirus (I use avira) during gigs.

this is sooooo wrong.

since I updated the nvidia card has disappeared, i can"t even install new drivers because no nvidia GFX card can be found.

I've been using PCs for 15 years. I've never had so much crap at once.

the more I update drivers the more it doesn't work.


EDIT : and after rebooting twice (one wasn't enough apparently) the nvidia card is back.

why do I have more and more the impression that alienware laptops are like a pile of expensive high end components plugged together without any further work done on the stability of the product ?

sorry i'm a bit angry, never put as much money in a laptop and never had as much problems at once (never had any problem actually, except normal stuff such as HDD failure, overheating, beer spilled in the keyboard...). worse is that the initial stability problem is probably not resolved.

 

This is a mess. And it's nothing like my experience, which makes me think you may have some sort of hardware problem that needs some tech to look at it.

But since you need this for work, you need stability right away. Have you considered swapping out your wifi card to see if that may be causing conflicts or something like that?

 

a) you post some possible link to 3rd party software as a problem but refuse to remove it citing you like it better than the built in one (which is ok actually).

b) you keep messing with it and digging a deeper hole

We would like nothing better than to help you sort the problem but it really appears you have either some hardware issue or perhaps some sort of conflict with software. Did you have any issues before installing/downloading/updating? If not, and you still want to chase this without Dell support, get system back to that earlier state ASAP and start the testing process over.

If however you had issues right out of the box then do not spend another minute wasting your time. Get support on the case right away. Depending on location you can get next day support which might have solved your problem already. I suspect your solution will be a MB replacement. Even if it could be fixed another way I doubt Dell will do anything too complex for fixing.

The other option is return if still in your window and location allows it. Time is ticking!

 

I still have removed nothing except turning off windows firewall (no need for a double firewall) and dell stage remote (the only dell thing I really dared to remove).

I will try another firewall than commodo (btw if someone knows a good other one, I'd be glad to replace commodo, I just don't want to rely on windows firewall).

I thought I got rid of BSODs by updating everything but got one today (while watching a movie) (whocrashed pointed towards bigfoot drivers this time). it was just after going back from sleep mode. many issues I had came from sleep and hiber mode. not exclusively though, still some unexplicable ones.

 

Windows firewall is damn good enough. A firewall is simple with pretty much two schools of thought: loose/manual where you config -vs- automated where all is blocked by default. Otherwise they all work the same.

YOU DO NOT NEED A FWall for testing.

If you are home or work it is quite likely your system is already behind a firewall. Ditto for cafe with your main risk being other users nearby.

In the end, if you have not taken advantage of your warranty then this is a problem of your own making. I'm very very sure Dell would have replaced the MB or system by now and solved your problem. Good luck!

 

Have you tired removing you Bigfoot wireless yet? There have been many threads on how it was causing BSOD's on many systems.

 

not yet, but i tryed the latest drivers (released some days ago).
still get BSODs.

but now it's pretty stable. the only BSODs I get are related to sleep mode.

e.g. if I put the computer in sleep mode, on battery, and wake it up plugged to AC and to HDMI, I'm pretty sure it will do a BSOD.

if I put it to sleep, wake it up, put it to sleep again it generally crashes too.

hibernation mode almost always crash the computer.

for now I'll avoid these situations. (although I don't call it a solved problem at all).

I have not the time now to run some tests (these situations happened several times during normal casual use).

I wouldn't mind removing bigfoot drivers if I wasn't using wifi. but I really need it (especially during my gigs, I control ableton via wifi).

when I have more time I'll run it with windows firewall, without commodo, without the bigfoot drivers, do plenty of sleep/hiber mode switches and see what happens.

and i'll post the results.

 

totally stable since the last bigfoot killer drivers.

still removed alien respawn. got bored of the popup asking me to buy the full version. anyway the free version only permits a "factory reset", which is totally doable without it.

 

as an FYI, it is possible to install drivers without the manager (at least for 1102).