How to work around the AlienFX HRESULT E_FAIL error and create a theme anyway...

Right - if you have this error when you try to create a new fx profile for a program:

'Error HRESULT E_FAIL has been returned from a call to a COM component'

Then here is a guide on how to work around it. This is an error which crashes AlienFX when you try to click the '+' sign to add a program to your FX profile.

1. Download Microsoft XML Notepad & install.
2. Open AlienFX Editor, create a new advanced profile & configure as you want to then save it.
3. Navigate to c:\users\your name\appdata\local\alienware\alienware fx & copy the newly created theme to the desktop.
4. Open the copy on the desktop with the XML notepad.
5. Navigate to 'Theme' on the left hand side. In here you can change the Tempo (200 = fast, 1000 = slow) and the name of the profile as it appears in AlienFX.
6. Navigate to 'Visualizations'. Find the last entry by ID number & duplicate. Then alter the values of this duplicate entry as follows:

VisualizationID - use the next available number as 1-10 are already in use.
Name - How you want your 3rd party application to look in AlienFX.
VizualizationID - use '4' for a 3rd party application.
ThemeID - use '1'
Application Name - i.e. use 'Quake4.exe' - the execuatble of the 3rd party application you wish to make an fx profile for.
DeviceID - use '1'

7. Navigate to 'Zones'. Find the last entry by ID number & duplicate. You need to create 8 zone entries - one for each fx region except the power button & Alienhead (these can be changed but thats advanced). Then alter the values of this duplicate entrys as follows:

VisualizationID - same number you used above
ZoneID - use the next available one
Name - see the list below
Loop - use 'true' or 'false'
Flags - see the list below
Fixed - see the list below
ID - see the Groups ID list below
Flagsusedforreplication - use '0000'

Groups Name Flags Fixed

1 Keyboard 1 007F false
2 Keyboard 2 007F false
3 Keyboard 3 007F false
4 Keyboard 4 007F false
5 Speakers 007F false
7 Alienware Name 007F false
8 Touchpad 0044 true
9 Media 0044 true

6 Alienhead 0004 true
10 Power Button 8004 true

So - make your 8 Zone entries then ...

8. Navigate to 'Zone Groups' - find the last one by zoneid number & duplicate - again you need to make 8 duplicates.

ZoneID - same number as you used above.
GroupID - use the same number you used in zones

Once you have done 8 of these....

9. Navigate to 'Actions' - find the last one by ActionID & duplicate - again make 8 duplicates.

ZoneID - same as you used above
ActionID - next spare number - you can get clever here & link to other profiles if you want
ActiontypeID - (1=morph, 2=Pulse, 3=Set Colour, 4=Loop & 5=play power status)
Colour1 - see table below
Colour2 - see table below (use #FF000000 unless morphing)
Duration - (0=short, 1=long)

Hex Colour

#FFF00000 Red
#FFF05000 Orange
#FF00F000 Green
#FFF000000 Black
#FFF0E000 Yellow
#FF00A0F0 Light Blue
#FFFFFFFF White
#FF0000F0 Dark Blue
#FF00F0F0 Turquoise
#FFF000F0 Pink

Done.

It's fairly intuitive once you start - takes around 15 mins to make a fx colour profile for a new application - but if you cannot use the fx editor to make one then this will work for you.

Here's a Rainbow theme I have done - you'll see that you can program the Touchpad to morph & that there are individual row entries for the left & right speaker - see what you think....