Solved Firefox out of curiosity does anyone else have this problem?

[Andyrids]

Up to FF 29 it worked almost flawlessly and as of late FF 37 kind of worked ok... So me being fed up with tabs that do not switch correctly (seems to happen when you have a couple of tabs with sites that are using flash) I downloaded and installed FF 39 thinking maybe they have fixed this problem, well so far so good however FF now takes almost 60 seconds to initially load up ! Ok fair enough I do not have the worlds fastest computer or most modern but this is a browser for f sake not some super duper megalithic design CAD software you know what I am saying ?

Now I am no noob I know all about problems with corrupt profiles and outdated plugins and I reinstall Windows more often than I change my underwear both on my own system and also others people bring me to repair and on every system / new install I still experience these problems with FF.

Don't get me wrong I am not complaining as such or looking for help I am just curious to know if anyone else experiences afore mentioned problems? or is it just me lol even IE11 works better than FF the main reason I use FF is because I have became so used to using Firebug to debug website issues I know IE and FF has built in versions but they are slightly different.

 

[Not Myself]

1. Disable Firebug, which is known to cause problems.

2. Try starting Firefox in Safe Mode, by holding down shift key while clicking on Fx icon; what happens?

3. Run the Standard Diagnostics: Standard diagnostic - Firefox - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

Your problems are almost certainly caused by something in your particular installation, most likely in the profile, and quite possibly easily fixed.

 

[Andyrids]

1. Disable Firebug, which is known to cause problems.

2. Try starting Firefox in Safe Mode, by holding down shift key while clicking on Fx icon; what happens?

3. Run the Standard Diagnostics: Standard diagnostic - Firefox - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

Your problems are almost certainly caused by something in your particular installation, most likely in the profile, and quite possibly easily fixed.

New install no profile import or plugins... Thank you for your advice however I do not need it mate,my post was made in question if anyone else is experiencing the same the problems ?

 

[jamis]

In a word, no. FF v39 with AdBlockPlus and Ghostery enabled. About 4 seconds to load and display the home page. Curious, does your homepage have served up advertisements?

 

[Not Myself]

New install no profile import or plugins... Thank you for your advice however I do not need it mate,my post was made in question if anyone else is experiencing the same the problems ?

1. Most people asking if others have the same problem are trying to fix the problem(s) that they have.

2. Stating that you don't have a profile makes no sense, as Firefox without a profile will never run. If by "New install" you mean that you deleted both Firefox and whatever profile(s) you had, then the new install would have automatically created a new profile. However, if you only deleted Fx, and did not delete profile(s), then your new install is using whatever profile was previously your default profile.

If the latter condition is true, then the unwanted advice I provided you is still valid, and you would be well advised to follow it. If the former condition, however, is true, then something external to Fx, such as firewalls and anti-virus programs, is/are the proximate cause(s) of what you are encountering.

 

[Andyrids]

@Not Myself: Sorry I should have worded my reply to you better than that it did sound a tad offensive and that was not my intention, please accept my apology.

I had uninstalled FF using Revo Uninstaller and then went in looking for traces of the old profile and the default one then removed what was left then did a restart... With the new install I did not install the maintenance service and did not import any plugins / extensions or my old profile just to clarify so it was a clean install and using a new profile that FF created itself.

Firewall is the Windows one and AV is the latest free version of Avast, the hosts file is not the default one though I have added a couple of my own entries in there, one to block the adverts in Skype when I have it running and another to block my ISP's evil browser helper thing. I have never had any problems with those entries being in the hosts file before so I am assuming they are ok.

@jamis: My home page is Start Page the search engine and that as far as I can tell does not load up any adverts at least not on it's home page.

The delay is long if I just open the browser itself by clicking on the icon, however it loads up considerably quicker if I open one of my own HTML pages that only consists of a table of links to various WHM and Cpanel accounts I need to maintain... This kind of makes me wonder if FF is actually calling home or somewhere else during the initial program execution ?

IE11 on the other hand opens almost instantly by either using the HTML file I mentioned or clicking on the IE icon and the homepage IE is using is the MSN news one so there is plenty of things getting loaded up on that page in way of adverts and slides.

 

[Not Myself]

I am about out of brilliant ideas, given what you have done. (Of course they are brilliant, they are mine...).

I am rather convinced, again based on what you have done, that whatever the cause is, it is your computer, rather than Fx; that is, your machine and Fx do not completely agree with each other, whereas, based on mozillaZine traffic, Fx 39.0 is basically okay. I did have one conflict, on one of two computers: On one, the latest Flash, 18.0.0.209, crashed every time, a problem I had not previously encountered. A mozillaZine moderator suggested two things to try; I chose to go to Fx/Options/Advanced/deselect "Use hardware acceleration," which fixed the malady. Seems unlikely to me, but you might try it. The other suggestion was to turn off some option in Flash, which warns of security problems.

My second, and of course, brilliant idea, is that you register for mozillaZine ( Index page ? mozillaZine Forums ) and draw on the vast and deep knowledge of users of that system for assistance.

Finally, a ten-pound sledge hammer can quickly fix many computer problems.

 

[jamis]

I thought this week Mozilla turned off any possibility of using Flash in FF. Depending on the website visited, I get one of two messages that inform that Flash has crashed or that Flash is dangerous and is disabled. Don't mean to hijack this thread, but thought it was worth tossing out. Hasn't had any effect on load times though.

http://www.sevenforums.com/news/375540-firefox-blocking-flash-default.html

 

[Andyrids]

There's a thing now I did download the latest flash and am using that with V39 FF, but it does not seem to be causing any problems FF works ok once it finally loads up... Yes I had disabled hardware acceleration also but it does not seem to make any difference one way or the other on my system.

Looking at resource monitor when FF is loading up there is a lot of network traffic being requested even with the home page being changed to blank and I also have the option to never check for updates checked and no maintenance service installed for FF as far as I understand it should not be attempting to connect to anything... if this was somebody else's computer I got handed I would say it's a malware or adware problem but that is not the case here.

I think your probably right FF just does not like my system I have had various problems with it since V30 nothing major just annoyances and the other systems I get to fix are almost all of a similar spec to this one, mainly Sony and Lenovo nothing newer than 3 years old... as for the sledge hammer solution don't tempt me lol

 

[MoxieMomma]

Hi:

I agree with all of @Not Myself's advice -- it is the standard approach to troubleshooting.
As mentioned, the vast majority of problems originate in the user's profile, NOT the program itself.
Simply reinstalling Firefox rarely resolves most issues for that very reason.

If Mozilla safe mode (NOT Windows safe mode) & other steps suggested HERE (such as disabling hardware acceleration, as suggested) don't resolve the issue, then a more drastic (but helpful) step is the creation of new, plain, "vanilla" profile (with no installed extensions, no changes to preferences, etc.).
(You don't lose the "old" profile, especially if you back it up first.)

If that fixes the problem, then bookmarks can be imported from the old profile, and (one-by-one) extensions can be installed and preferences "tweaked".

The default disabling of Flash in Firefox with version 39 may be related. But that change can be easily configured at the user level and doesn't really explain the OP's issues.

>>There may well be something amiss with your global plug-ins or their settings, such as Flash Player.

>>The other thing I didn't notice in the discussion thus far: your security applications (AV, firewall, etc.).

So, yes, I agree with the suggestions to proceed stepwise through the STANDARD DIAGNOSTIC.
If that fails, then consulting with the many power-users and script kiddies over at the mozillazine forums would likely lead to a solution.
There are other resources available at support.mozilla.org, but the forum traffic there is very light.

Hope this helps,

 

[Andyrids]

I thought this week Mozilla turned off any possibility of using Flash in FF. Depending on the website visited, I get one of two messages that inform that Flash has crashed or that Flash is dangerous and is disabled. Don't mean to hijack this thread, but thought it was worth tossing out. Hasn't had any effect on load times though.

http://www.sevenforums.com/news/375540-firefox-blocking-flash-default.html

The new flash is not being blocked now by FF but the previous version is, new versions of Chrome and Safari are blocking even the latest version of flash now by default.

So yes it was worth you mentioning that and actually has got me thinking again that indirectly could this be part of the problem I am experiencing the initial traffic before FF loads up is it checking the flash version I wonder? and could it be that I have a bad flash installation... only way to be sure methinks is set up a duel boot and try this combination of flash and FF on a clean Windows install... that can wait until tomorrow though.

@MoxieMomma, hi just got email notification of your response whilst I was typing the above and since you mentioned it could be a borked flash install also then yeah I will investigate further into that... thanks for the resource links by the way.

 

[MoxieMomma]

Hi:

I suspect you already know this, but there are separate versions of Flash Player for Firefox and other "plug-in" type browsers, as opposed to the version for IE (Active X).
You have to update all of them.
IOW, if you only update the ActiveX /IE version of Flash Player, Firefox will still detect a problem if you have an outdated "Plug-In" version of Flash Player.

I get them here, to avoid the bundled freebies/junkware: https://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/distribution3.html

Also, you still have mentioned what your security set-up is (AV, firewall)???

{{If there were a serious problem with Fx 39 itself, the mozillazine forums and other places would be "lighting up" with problems. They are not...}}

Cheers,

 

[Andyrids]

Yes though I have never bothered with installing or using flash with IE (apart from siliverlight many moons and many clean Windows installs ago) the flash I downloaded was from that same link you just supplied and was the version for plugin type browsers...

AV is the latest free version of Avast and the firewall is the built in Windows one.

I can well imagine the Mozilla forums would be swamped if there was a problem yes and like you say they are not and since none of you people are having the same issues as me then it has to be something other than FF itself... hmm lucky me

 

[Callender]

Here are some things you might look at.

A full removal of flash player followed by a reboot and clean install of flash player. I've had problems in the past where the dedicated flash player removal tool actually didn't remove all files and folders and the leftovers had to be manually removed.

For slow launch issues I've always used SpeedyFox.

For flash content on webpages I've always used Click to Play Per Element.

Check this post MetaScan Online For Firefox to scan connections.

Also see this post:

http://www.sevenforums.com/browsers-mail/351579-firefox-33-startup-issue.html

In particular check cache aftef launching Firefox.

 

[Not Myself]

as far as I understand it should not be attempting to connect to anything...

You have a misunderstanding, for Fx most certainly does attempt to connect upon loading, most specifically the Google `anti-badware' lists. See Fx/Options/General, items 2 & 3. Those lists are updated periodically, and Fx checks to see if any new lists are available.

There are probably other things Fx does on start-up; finding out that sort of information is a good example as to why I recommend mozillaZine, as an inquiry about this there is very likely to get quick, well-informed replies.

Also, just in case you are not aware of this, Fx and other browsers will take longer to load than IE, as IE is built into Windows, and at least part of it loads when the computer starts, whereas other browsers have to load their entire programs when they are started.

 

[jamis]

I have Flash v18.0.0.209, updated on 07/14/2015 and it crashes under FF v39. I'm no longer getting the "blocked" error message, but just the crash message when trying to play Flash video. Not a biggie, I'll just wait for something to work itself out.

 

[Callender]

I have Flash v18.0.0.209, updated on 07/14/2015 and it crashes under FF v39. I'm no longer getting the "blocked" error message, but just the crash message when trying to play Flash video. Not a biggie, I'll just wait for something to work itself out.

How many versions of the flash player plugin show up if you look here?

C:\Windows\system32\Macromed\Flash\

C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash\

Do you have the flash plugin installed for any other browsers?

 

[Not Myself]

I have Flash v18.0.0.209, updated on 07/14/2015 and it crashes under FF v39. I'm no longer getting the "blocked" error message, but just the crash message when trying to play Flash video. Not a biggie, I'll just wait for something to work itself out.

Did you first remove any earlier versions of Flash before installing 18.0.0.209? If not, use the Adobe uninstall program, then reinstall: link in on this page:

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-playe...n_Download_the_Adobe_Flash_Player_uninstaller

This should always be done before updating Flash.

If you did, then first try turning off hardware acceleration in Fx; if that does not work, then in the Flash plugin (NOT an extension, a plugin) in Fx, turning off "Enable Adobe Flash protected mode" in the plugin's Options.

 

[jamis]

I have Flash v18.0.0.209, updated on 07/14/2015 and it crashes under FF v39. I'm no longer getting the "blocked" error message, but just the crash message when trying to play Flash video. Not a biggie, I'll just wait for something to work itself out.

How many versions of the flash player plugin show up if you look here?

C:\Windows\system32\Macromed\Flash\

C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash\

Do you have the flash plugin installed for any other browsers?

The only version that shows is 18.0.0.209 everywhere.

Flash is also installed in IE11 and is v18.0.0.209. I don't use IE11, but just checked and Flash works fine there.

 

[Callender]

@ Jamis

Suggest backing up your FF profile and extensions before fully removing Firefox and then clean installing it.