Recent Laptop Comparison - Great Value - The Low-End and the High-End

Story
I was helping my wife pick and choose a laptop to buy really cheap and affordable, but a machine that would not go out of use too quickly.

Uses it must handle:
* browsing
* Skyping
* email
* YouTube

I compared laptops from 3 websites where she lives, but the one below had a better selection, and comparable prices to the other 2 websites, so I'm just going to include the one website:
https://www.thegioididong.com/laptop/?trang=1

If you visit the website, you will see they sell many brands, including:
* Acer
* Asus
* Lenovo
* Dell
* HP
* Mac

What I was looking for

I was looking through all the offerings within the last few days, and comparing the power that each machine offers which includes comparing the following:
* Note: The most important factor to me is the processor, without the right processor nothing else matters!

Factors Considered:
1. Most importantly, the processor
* right now software seems to run okay on 2 core processors, which means the future is more than 2 cores.  I like to buy with the future in mind, because I don't like to buy something and have to replace it so soon after. This meant that I only wanted to look for and find 4 core processor laptops. 

2. The Memory
* right now, 8 GB is best to have, 4 GB is minimum, so anything 4 GB or higher

3. Graphics Card
* if you don't do gaming, which my wife doesn't, an integrated graphics card will do just fine, but if you do some gaming, you should look for one that has a graphics card that is not integrated as it will perform better, especially if it doesn't have to share memory with the rest of the laptop

4. Hard Disk Drive (HDD) - not very important
* 500 GB will do for most people, so anything more than that is bonus


I think, if you buy a laptop based on brand, you are cheating yourself out of finding a good deal.  What you should be comparing first are the above, taking into account your budget.
* Most people say to take into account how you are going to use it, but I think it's best to buy the best machine that your budget can buy you, that way you won't have to replace it so soon after buying it, depending on your budget.

Budget
The budget really was the cheapest machine that would be able to handle the tasks she performs.

In this case, I compared all machines to find a 4 core processor, I wasn't sure I would find one, so I kept a tab on the 2 core processors as well, keeping track of the most powerful one within a small budget.  Small budget means a few hundred dollars. I was thinking $400 - $500 CAD.

Findings

To my surprise, I found a machine that fit my wife's use, and was affordable, and had 4 cores.

Acer Aspire ES1 411, 14" Laptop
* Processor: Intel Pentium N3540 2.16 GHz (Turbo 2.66 GHz)
* RAM Memory: 4GB
* HDD: 500 GB
* Graphics Card: Integrated
* Link: https://www.thegioididong.com/laptop/acer-aspire-es1-411-004
* Cost:$7,290,000 VND  (approx $396 CAD)

Drawback:
I guess a draw back would be that it doesn't have a disc drive.

Intel's Website for Processor Details:
http://ark.intel.com/products/82105/Intel-Pentium-Processor-N3540-2M-Cache-up-to-2_66-GHz


Side Note about the Processor:
I'm not sure what kind of processor this is other than it is an Intel Pentium processor. Usually on Intel's website they would say Celeron if it was a Celeron processor.  I know the website where it is listed is calling it a Celeron, but I'm not sure that is right or not.  I thought it might be an Atom processor, because I came across a posting that talked about the Atom Processor, saying something positive about this release of the processor.
* I usually don't buy Celeron because it is slow, no sure if this one is Celeron or not, though if it is, it's okay, as I was just so happy with it being a 4 core processor that it made it okay

Other Reviews:
I checked out some reviews online, and most people said it was a great value for the price.  Of course at this price range, you won't be impressed with the material, or design, that's a given.  If you are like me though, that stuff doesn't matter, it's what's inside that counts, and this cheap affordable laptop had what counts, and what I was looking for.

I also looked at 2 websites for bench marks comparing it to other processors, but the charts didn't show any of the i3 and i5 processors I was comparing, and so they didn't affect my decision much. I just know that having more cores is better for multitasking.  I'm not so sure I go for the hyper-threading technology.  I thinking having 4 physical cores is better than having 2 cores processing 4 threads (2 threads per core).

Anyways, I sent my wife the findings, and she was okay with going to buy that laptop.  Though, the next day, I found out that she didn't buy it, saying that it was ugly, and she wasn't impressed with the quality of material, and webcam resolution.  I told her that she shouldn't be concerned about those things when buying a laptop/computer, and so after some discussion, she agreed that would be the best laptop to buy. Though, in closing, she added that she wanted to spend a bit more money to get a laptop that would last a while.

Reviewing Higher-End Laptops
Due to my wife's last remark, I decided to have another look at the laptops to see what other 4 core processors the website offered.  I looked through all the i3 and i5 processor laptops, and none of them offered the 4 core processor I was looking for. I even looked up the i7-4510U processor, and it turned out to be a 2 core processor.  There's no way I was going to even think of spending that amount of money on a laptop that had only 2 cores.

On that website, you will see the i7 4510U laptop offerings range from 17,590,000 VND to 19,990,000 VND (approx $954 CAD to $1084.90 CAD)

So, I looked at the even more expensive laptops, and found

Lenovo Y5070, 15.6" Laptop
Processor: i7-4710HQ 2.5 GHz (Turbo up to 3.5 GHz)
RAM Memory: 8GB
Graphics Card: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 860M, 4 GB
HDD: 1 TB
Link: https://www.thegioididong.com/laptop/lenovo-y5070
Cost: $24,990,000 VND, which is approx $1356.26 CAD

Wow!  I thought.  This is such a powerful machine, and it doesn't even cost that much.  Okay, so it is a lot of money, but for the power you get, it's really good value!  It has great design, is pleasing to the eyes, and has more power than a normal user would ever need. Perfect!


So, the next day, I spoke with my wife, and told her to consider buying the Lenovo Y5070.  I spoke to her later that night, and she told me that she went to see the Lenovo, and wanted to buy the Lenovo Y5070, but it was out of her price range, and they didn't offer a payment plan, so she couldn't buy it.  So instead she bought the Acer Aspire that I recommended first.


I did some additional checking to see how much they sell Online to the Canadian market, and the prices are comparable, about the same.  On Lenovo's home website, they offer many different configurations for the same model laptop, Y5070.  Some have more RAM memory, more or less graphics card memory, more or less had drive space, some come with an internal disc drive. 

I think laptops really have come down in price since the last time I bought one which was actually a very long time ago in 2003 but I remember paying $1500 + tax (for my Pentium III 3.2 GHz with hyper threading), or Lenovo has really good prices! For this laptop that has 4 processor cores, 8 threads, you pay only $1029 + shipping + tax. See partial details below. That's the price on the Canadian website.  If you are looking for a laptop, I'd say buy this one!

NOTE:
* If you are more of a gamer, buy the one that has 4 GB of graphics card memory, and possibly more RAM memory, it cost a bit more, but it seems there is a lot of value for a great price. Plus, it should last many years to come as many new software, and operating releases work just fine with 2 processor cores at the moment.
* If you don't need a CD/DVD drive, it can be even cheaper! :0)

This is a direct link to the Canadian website for the laptop. This laptop has 2 GB less memory than the one offered on the Vietnam site which is a part of the reason why it's cheaper. For me, 2 GB of graphics memory is good enough, and should be good enough for normal users up to even light gamers:

Lenovo Y50-70 $1029
* Processor: i7-4710HQ (2.5 GHz, Turbo up to 3.5 GHz)
* Ram Memory: 8 GB
* Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M 2GB
* HDD: Hybrid 1TB 5400 RPM+8GB SSHD
* Link: http://shop.lenovo.com/ca/en/laptops/lenovo/y-series/y50/?sb=:000001CA:00005F5B:


Anyways, hope the information I've provided helps you in one way or another.  Happy hunting!

AppleSyncNotifier.exe - Entry Point Not Found

Story
Have you ever run into this issue before?  I have, twice now!  It seems to happen every time I install, or reinstall 'apple itunes'.

Here's the error message box I get after I've installed/reinstalled 'apple itunes' software.

Message Window Title: AppleSyncNotifier.exe - Entry Point Not Found
Description: The procedure entry point sqlite3_wal_checkpoint could not be located in the dynamic link library SQLite3.dll

Screen Capture




What a horrible message this is.  It doesn't even tell us what folder it is look for the file in.

Debugging
1. I did a google search for the exact message, and the first result wasn't helpful at all
2. I tried to remember what I did last time to fix this, and I actually remembered.  It was a long time ago, so I can't remember the source, so I'll just include the solution.


Solution
1. To fix this issue, you have to copy SQLite3.dll from one apple program folder to another.  SQLite3.dll should be on your computer, just not in the folder that the Apple Sync Notifier is looking.

Copy file:

SQLite3.dll

from

C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Apple\Apple Application Support\
* this is where I found the SQLite3.dll file.
* If you can't find it in this folder, do a search in the following path to find the file:
- C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Apple\

to

C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Apple\Mobile Device Support\
* this is where I found the "AppleSyncNotifier.exe" file
* again, if you don't see the .exe file in this folder, search for it in the folder
- C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Apple\
and then copy the SQLite3.dll file to this folder

2. Reboot your computer, and the error message should be gone

Conclusion/Comments
Apple really needs to fix that installer of theirs, but until they do, this should fix your issue.

(Again, I like to hear from you if this posting helped you out or not, so leave a message.)

Drobo Pro - Can't Access Files After it is detected by Windows 7 and not detected by Drobo Dashboard - What a Nightmare!!

Story - What a Nightmare!!
I initiated a large folder copy, and move operation to backup a folder on my C:\ drive to my Z:\ drive (Drobo Pro backup).  Windows popped open the normal copy window with the normal calculation... message.  I waited, and waited, and waited, about 10-20 minutes, and the window had still not finished calculating, and still didn't start copying/moving the files.  I decided to wait another 30min-1 hr (forgot exactly how long), when I came back, windows still didn't start moving the files!  Okay, now I'm getting really impatient!!  I decide to cancel the move operation, and windows opened it's cancel window, but nothing happened... waited again, and still nothing happened, already having lost my patience, I decided to force Windows Explorer to shutdown.  It stopped responding, and wouldn't shutdown.  I tried to end the task via 'Task Manager', and it still wouldn't shutdown.  The only thing I saw happen was that the windows task bar disspeared, and everything was frozen on my computer.

Next, I decided to shutdown my computer via the windows key on my keyboard since I lost access to the windows taskbar.  No response.

Last resort, I held down the computer power button until my computer powered off.  I turned it back on after waiting 30 seconds.  I can't remember if Drobo turned off or not at this point.  Anyways, the computer booted back up, but now the Drobo volumes could not be accessed even with 'Drobo Dashboard' displaying the drive, and 2 volumes.

I took off the cover plate on my 'Drobo Pro', and the 2 lights were solid green.  I waited for the 'Activity' light to turn off, but it never did, and I wasn't copying anything to the drive after the reboot, and there were no other flashing LED lights for each drive, so now that I can't access the drive, and I've determined it's not busy, I use the power button on the back of the device to power it off.

Next, I power it back on after it had powered off.  It came back on, but strangely the number of blue lights had reduced from 4 LEDs to 3 LEDs.  This scared me a bit, thinking it could only mean that there was data loss!  This started a slow panic.  I still wasn't sure if the data was lost or not, so I tried to keep my cool.

Next, windows detected my drive, but strangely 'Drobo Dashboard' did not.  Uh, oh, now what?  I clicked on the Y:\ volume, and it displayed the content.  Then I clicked on the other volume Z:\ and explorer stopped responding.  I wasn't able to access my files, uh oh!!
* Now I'm really considering that I've lost all my files, I start to panic!!

Google
I head onto Google to do a search to see if anyone has ever had this problem.  I don't come across any postings that list a crash after a failed copy command, with the drives no longer responding, and Drobo Dashboard no longer detecting 'Drobo Pro'.
* I did multiple searches, and even followed the directions on the following 3 drobo forum pages, but it didn't work:

http://support.drobo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/621
http://support.drobo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/445/session/L2F2LzEvdGltZS8xMzg4MzcxOTMwL3NpZC9Za0NUdzRKbA%3D%3D
http://support.drobo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/161

I didn't call tech support, as I no longer have the free support.  I think my unit is 3-4 years old, so it's long expired.  Though, I was highly considering the call.

I felt like I was having a nightmare, and started thinking of all the data that would be lost if I couldn't get the Drobo to come back; Photos, files, videos, going back to who knows when that I've never burned up on disc.  Oh boy, I was really regretting not doing that now!  My thought now was, if I get this to start working again, I'm going to buy everything onto DVDs!

I spent the next hour or so, rebooting my computer after it froze from trying to access Drobo, and rebooting Drobo each time as well.  I must have tried this 3 times before deciding it wasn't a problem that could be fixed with a fresh 'shutdown/reboot' of both my computer, and the 'Drobo Pro Unit'.
* now what??

Solution
* Perform at your own risk, I will not be responsible for anything that goes wrong!!  I only know that the following is what I tried, and what worked for me.  Be very careful when removing your Hard Disk Drives that Drobo is off, otherwise it will think the drive failed, and attempt to rebuild, or even fail and you may lose all your data
1. Running on desperation, I decided to do something I wouldn't dare do, but that I read about a long time ago about how you can move your drives from one drobo unit to another.  And from something I had just read from one of the forum pages about what a normal Drobo boot looks like, I decided do the following because I want to see if my Drobo Unit is still good or not.  I also know that removing all my drives with Drobo turned off is okay, as long as they are all reinserted with the power off, before the power is switched back on (as if moving from one unit to another):
i) I shutdown my drobo unit with no activity lights on, using the switch at the back of drobo
ii) After it turned off fully, I popped out every drive that I had in the unit, far enough so that none of them would be detected in the unit
iii) I rebooted my computer - for safety measures (probably not needed, but I did it anyways)
iv) After my computer booted up fully, I turned on 'Drobo', and without any drives installed, it booted very quickly, and lit up one drive LED in red (I didn't take note of what the other LED colours were)
* you may want to remove the power cord for safe measures, to make sure Drobo is fully off
* this seemed normal, so I concluded that there was nothing wrong with my unit
v) Next, I used the power button on Drobo to power it back off
vi) With the 'Drobo Unit' fully off, I reinsert all drives into the Drobo Unit, making sure they all drives are fully inserted
* you may want to remove the power cord for safe measures, to make sure Drobo is fully off
vii) Next, I power on the 'Drobo Unit', and wait it boot
viii) It powers on successfully, but I notice that there are still only 3 LED blue lights instead of 4, but in Windows 7, I'm able to access the files on each of the 2 volumes in my Drobo ... relief at last!!
* knowing this, I suspect the 4th blue LED light is off because the Dual Redundancy checkbox must have been unchecked by the issue at some point
* I check the Drobo Dashboard menu, Drobo Settings > General, and what do you know, the 'Dual Redundancy' was unchecked, so I rechecked it, and clicked 'OK' to save my change
* the lights blue lights changed from 3 to 4
ix) The array appears to need to rebuild itself, estimating 4 hours

Closing Comments
So relieved!!  I can't even believe that the random (thought) removal of the drives, and reinserting them was what fixed the issue, but Boy! am I happy it did!!  I felt like my heart was going to stop for a moment there when I thought all my data was lost!
* so glad I didn't have to call tech support too as I've read many bad reviews on the support provided

To Do List
1. Burn all files in my Drobo Pro to disc - JUST IN CASE!!  :0)

(Please leave your questions, and comments, I'd like to hear if this helped anyone else.)

Setting up my 2nd Drobo 5N

Note: Second Drobo 5N Device Configuration Story
* This is a continuation of my first posting.  This is an update on how my 2nd Drobo 5N setup went.

Story
Even though I knew that a 'Reset' of the Drobo settings would probably make this Drobo recognize the drives, I wanted to see if I could capture the error messages that I didn't capture in the first Drobo 5N setup.  Drobo behaved differently, possibly due to me already attempting to set it up previously but failing to do so.  Yes, so this is actually my 2nd attempt to setup this Drobo 5N.

Here's what happened with this unit.

1. I decided to follow the quick start guide this time.  I put the 2 hard drives (2 TB) into the top 2 slots as shown in the quick start guide.
2. Having already updated the Dashboard software on my computer, I connected the Network cable to the device and the other end was connected to the router.  I connected the power cable, and then turned the device on.
3. Strangely, it only detected the drive in the 2nd slot down , and then it entered data protection mode, and took 1 hour to run, even though there was no data in the drives
* it's like it detected the top most drive, but couldn't recognize it, and saw the 2nd drive, and was able to install it, so it might of thought that drive 1 just died or something along those lines

Below is a screen capture of what I saw in the Dashboard.  It says to add a drive to the top bay, but I had a good working drive already in that slot.

4. Next, I decided to do a full reboot of the Drobo 5N device to see if it picks up the top drive.  When it finished rebooting, the lights on the unit were solid red.  Here's the error messages I got next from the Dashboard:

Error Message - Drobo Dashboard
You may have removed or replaced too many hard drives from your Drobo at the same time. Re-insert the hard drives you removed. Important! When removing or replacing hard drives, make sure you remove or replace them one at a time. Never remove a drive when the drive bay indicators are blanking green and yellow.

Error Message - Error Popup Window (bottom corner)
Drobo doesn't recognize some of the drives you have installed in the data bays. They may have been previously formatted by Drobo or are from another Drobo. To troubleshoot, please consult the User's Guide or visit http://www.drobo.com/support.

 

5. Seeing how I could not get the exact same error messages from my first Drobo 5N setup, and seeing how Drobo 5N wasn't able to detect my hard drives even though they are good drives that should work in the device, I decided to apply my solution that I found from my first Drobo 5N configuration, i.e. Reset the device to factory defaults from the Drobo Dashboard

Solution

6.  Reset the device to factory defaults from the Drobo Dashboard

* Drobo Dashboard > Tools > Drobo Reset > 'Drobo Reset'

7. When the Reset of the Drobo 5N completed, the hard drive lights were all green, and the device was ready to go!!

Hope this helps those of you out there that have encountered this error, and like me spent hours trying to solve it!  

If you found this posting helpful, please leave me a comment!

Thank you for visiting!  Hope you have a good day!

Drobo 5N - Initial Setup Issues - It doesn't recognize my Computer Hard Drives!!

Story
I bought 2 brand new Drobo 5N's recently from TigerDirect.ca for Christmas presents for my sisters.  They were on sale at a good price, good for Drobos anyways. Still high, but it was within the range I was willing to pay for them. It took only 3 days to receive them, not counting the weekend.  I ordered them Friday, and they came Wednesday, today.

I was so excited to open them up, and setup them up with the 2 TB hard drives that I pulled out of my unit.  I had 4 of them ready to go.  I didn't think it would take so long to get the unit up and working, so I started working on it at 10pm. To my surprise, I had so much problems with it that I stayed up until 12:30am on a work night! Yikes! I'm the kind of person that has to solve problems with my computer once I've encounter it, so I got stuck working on it until I fixed it around 12:00am.

Anyways, I should continue with my story.  I opened up the first box, and it was nicely packaged.  I took the unit out. It was smaller than expected, which was nice, since my sister's don't like the big and bulky electronics.  Since having the DroboPro, I decided to not follow the instructions exactly, since it's a pretty smart unit, and it just auto-detects hard drives when they are inserted.  So, here's what I did.

1. I plugged in the network cable
2. I plugged in the power (with no hard drives installed yet)
3. I started my dashboard, but it didn't see my Drobo
* forgot that I had turned off 'auto-discovery', so I turned it back on
* you can access the 'Drobo Discovery Settings' from the 'All Drobos' tab
4. After I turned it on, it found the Drobo 5N which was connected to my router
* though, it showed the Drobo 5N as a 4 Drive Bay Drobo 
4. So, with the Drobo still connected, I visited their website,
    http://www.drobo.com/start/drobo-5n-start.php
and downloaded the latest software version 2.5.2 for windows.
5. After it finished downloading, I ran the install without uninstalling the previous version
* it did ask me if it could have permission to shutdown, and restart the Drobo Windows Service, and Dashboard when it finishes the install.  I clicked OK
6. It completed the installation successfully without issues

Next Issue: Drobo Requires Initialization
1. It reported that 'Drobo requires Initialization'
2. I didn't know what that meant, so I searched google, and found nothing... that wasn't helpful
3. Running on a hunch, I took the drives out, and put them into my StarTech.com Hard Drive dock, and found that 2 of the drives had not been initialized, and the others needed to be formatted
* I stuck one drive into the drive dock at a time, and had the 'Computer Disk Manager' open
** in windows 7, you can get to it if you click on the Windows Button > Right Click 'Computer', and Select 'Manage', then from the list on the left, under 'Storage', select 'Disk Management'
4. With this window open, when I put in the drives that required initialization, it immediately popped up a window asking if I wanted to initialize the drive
* for the first one, I didn't know if it was the correct drive, so I clicked 'no'
* I scrolled down to the drive, and where it lists the title 'Disk #', if you right click there, you can choose to initialize the drive, and then I chose MBR (i.e. Master Boot Record)
* After I initialized it, I did a quick format
* I repeated for all drives

5. I turned Drobo 5N off, then I put the drives back into the Drobo 5N unit, then after I put the drives in, I turned it back on
* I had found an article on the internet that said Barracuda drives can take up to 20 minutes to initialize (Drobo Forum), so I was patient and I waited, and waited.  When it was done, all lights were solid red, and it said it didn't recognize the drives I had installed.  It said I should get the latest firmware updates.
* I followed the instructions, and found out that I had the latest firmware already, so I didn't need the update, but what that appeared to mean was that my hard drives won't work in this unit, that I would have to go out to buy brand new ones - I definitely could not afford to spend anymore money on these Christmas Presents... so... as a last resort, I tried the following.  See 'My Solution' below.

My Solution
I was so fed up at this point that I was willing to try anything.  I was looking through the 'Tools' menu, and thought that maybe a 'Reset' of the 'Drobo' back to factory default setting might do the trick.  And low and behold, it worked!!!
* I reset my unit with the hard drives installed, with the Drobo dashboard reporting that it can't recognize the drives installed
* After the reset, all lights turned green, and the unit was ready to go!!
** I was sooo happy at this point, that I had to write about it!! :0)

Man! The unit had me worried for a very long time. I thought I would have to return it. Instead of an easy 10 minute setup, I spent 2-2.5 hours debugging, trying different things with my hard drives.  I even pull another one out of my DroboPro to see if it would work in the 5N before the reset, and it didn't.  Now I've got to wait for my DroboPro to rebuild itself... uurrrgghhh!!  It estimates 14 hours!  Darn it!

Here's how the dashboard looked after the Reset completed:

Well, I guess the best thing is that I now know what to do to setup the other Drobo 5N.  Start with the 'Tools' > Reset > Erase'.  Hopefully that setup will go a lot more smoothly.

Drobo's Solution
I later found this on Google, but it was after I had already found the solution myself.  I reviewed it, and I think it says to perform more steps than needed, probably to be safe.  My solution worked with just the Reset.  I didn't even have to reboot my computer.  See link below:
1. http://support.drobo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/683/kw/drive


Hope this article helps you out!  If it does, let me know.  It helps motivate me to write about more issues I've encountered, and solutions I've come up with. :0)

Alienware - Door Controller has stopped working

Issue
After installing the latest Alienware Command Centre I encountered this strange error on booting into windows. The lights on my Alienware Case stopped working, and it stopped reporting internal temperature, fan speed, and all that jazz.

Though, like a lot of things, it didn't bother me too much at first, but after a 3 weeks of seeing this error, I decided to look into what it could be.  It seems the latest version that I updated to has some sort of bug in it.

Looking for the Alienware Commend Centre Software
- NOTE: This didn't work, don't follow it, see section below named Solution: Found Alienware Command Centre - using Good Old Google!:

I didn't know where to get the Alienware Command Centre, so:
1. I looked to see if I had the CD that came with my Alienware desktop computer, but I didn't see any disk that included it.
2. Next, I went to the Support.Alienware.com website, strangely it redirected me to Alienware's home page instead of taking me to their support page.  That irritated me.  Nonetheless, I hovered the mouse over "Support" and clicked on "Device Drivers and Downloads" from the dropdown menu.

Next I selected the following from the dropdown lists:
* http://support.alienware.com/Support_Pages/Restricted_Pages/driver_downloads.aspx

1. Select an Operating System: Windows 7 x64 (you should choose your own OS)
2. Select a Component: Desktop Systems
3. Select a Manufacturer: Alienware(TM) Corporation
4. Select an item: <Select the desktop you purchased>

Click Search 

Clicked on Drivers and Downloads, and it took me to Dell's general support website...  
* GRRR, what the heck are they doing????

Oh my goodness!  Can they make it any more harder to find!?

Solution

Found Alienware Command Centre (using Good Old Google!)
1. From here, I decided to use google to search for the Alienware Command Centre
* typed into google:  alienware command center download

2. Then I clicked on the 2nd link as it showed a newer version of the Command Centre 2.7.25.0
http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/driverdetails?driverid=39XW1

3. Click 'Download File'

4. Uninstall Current Version of Alienware Command Center
1. Windows 7 > Windows Button (Start) > Control Panel > Programs and Features
* Alienware Command Center, click to select it from the list
* Click Uninstall button (above)
* Click to 'Remove All'
* Click Next until it starts, and finishes

2. When it was done, I rebooted my computer for good measure

3. I found the 'Alienware Command Center 2.7.25.0" (.exe) file that I downloaded from the Dell's website, and double clicked it to run it (where ever you saved it)
* follow the prompts, and click next until it starts installation
* at the end, it will reboot your computer

4. When Windows is finished rebooting the 'Door Controller..." Error will come up again.
* at this point, I thought "OMG", but then I tried to "Repair" the installation
* go into Control Panel > Programs and Features > Alienware Command Center, click to select it from the list
* Click Uninstall button (above), but this time, Select the option to repair/reinstall the program
* Click Next until it starts, and finishes

5. When it's done repairing, it will reboot the computer

6. For me, when it came back into Windows, everything was working again!
* No stupid "Door Controller..." error, and my lights worked again, and all the other monitoring systems in the 'Alienware Command Center' worked again.

Time Wasted
It took me 1.5 hours, but I tried the repair option with my first install without uninstalling it fully, and in that instance, it didn't work.  The problem only went away after a full uninstall, and reinstall, followed by the repair.  Weird if you ask me.  They really should fix their installer!!

Okay, hope this helps those of you out there that have encountered this problem!

Have a good day!


Dieu

Looking for a taskbar for Multiple Monitors?

Story
This ones going to be short, as I just want to share my findings.  This short posting is about the 3 Multiple Monitor taskbar programs I've tried.

Short Reviews

Multi-Monitor (Free Version)

* they have a free version, and it use to look good back when the main windows task bar wasn't translucent, but now, it looks dull, old and boring
* this is the first program I used which a fellow colleague at work referred me to way back when.  It was free at the time.  I think they didn't have the paid version yet.
* If you like dull and boring, this ones for you

Here's the link to their website:
* http://www.mediachance.com/free/multimon.htm

To Download
Click the download tab, scroll down a bit, and choose which version you want.  I'm not into paying for things, and so I tried only the free version

Actual Multiple Monitors
* this one has only a trial version for 30 days or so, and by the halfway point a dialog will open up each time windows boots up, and ask you to buy, enter your code, or continue.  I found this most annoying!
* this is one of the best task bars I've tried.  It has the nice windows 7 look and feel, and it also has the Windows Start button on it, so if you want to get at the Start Menu, you don't have to move your mouse back to the main monitor to get at it
* big downside is that there is no free version
* by day 22, I uninstalled it and looked for a free version

Here's the link in case your are interested, and possibly interested in buying it:
http://www.actualtools.com/multiplemonitors/download/

To Download
1. Scroll down the the 'Current Version' table, and click the link under file name to start downloading

Dual Monitor (Open Source) - *** RECOMMENDED!!
* I found this free Windows taskbar today that I never knew was freely available, so I got excited, and wanted to share it, hence this posting. 
* what this program does is extend your current task bar onto other monitors that you have extended your desktop to. It doesn't have the 'Windows Start Button', but it does have the nice Windows 7 look and feel which is important to me
* most importantly, it's FREE!

If you are interested in getting a taskbar that works, looks good, and your don't have to pay for, here's the link:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/dualmonitortb/

It says they've tested it with: Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7.  I currently have it installed on my machine which runs Windows 7.  If you don't have either one of these, then try it at your own risk.

To Download
Click the big green download button

Conclusion / Recommendations
I guess now-a-days, with the internet, and Open-Source, everyone should really look long and hard for free Open-Source tools, testing them out to see if they suite your needs, before paying a cent for Software. 

I recommend you trying out the "Dual Monitor" open source product.  It might just be what you've been looking for and need.

Though, maybe if you have so many monitors that moving your mouse back to the main one to get at the start button, and you don't have a Windows key on your keyboard, it may be worth your time to check out the "Actual Multiple Monitor" software product.

Hope this posting was helpful! :0)