Hi, this looks like a security program may be preventing Firefox from running. You say you've uninstalled your AV, but are you sure you don't have any other security programs installed - like Bitdefender etc?

Hold down the Shift key when you start Firefox to start in Safe Mode. More - Diagnose Firefox issues using Troubleshoot Mode.

If it works in Safe Mode, restart Firefox, then disable any theme or extensions you have - 3-bar menu > Add-ons > Themes/Extensions and restart Firefox again; now if it's OK, re-enable them one by one until you find the culprit. You may need to restart Firefox after enabling some extensions.

Note: If you use userChrome.css - you don't have it if you don't know what it is, this is also disabled in Safe Mode, so should be regarded as an additional suspect, and can be disabled to test by placing /* before, and */ after the file in the chrome folder, then restarting Firefox.

Try a Clean Reinstall; this means you remove your Firefox program files and then reinstall Firefox. This process does not remove your Firefox profile data (such as bookmarks and passwords), since that information is stored in a different location. With Firefox closed, use another browser to download Firefox from https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/all/ and save the file to somewhere convenient on your computer.

Now delete the Firefox installation folder which should be in one of the following locations -

C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox

You can now double click the file you previously downloaded to install Firefox.

If your question is resolved by this or another answer, please help other users by marking the best reply as Solved. Thank you!

Scribe said

Hi, this looks like a security program may be preventing Firefox from running. You say you've uninstalled your AV, but are you sure you don't have any other security programs installed - like Bitdefender etc?

I did not have any other security programs after I uninstalled my antivirus firewall software.

Hold down the Shift key when you start Firefox to start in Safe Mode. More - Diagnose Firefox issues using Troubleshoot Mode. If it works in Safe Mode, restart Firefox, then disable any theme or extensions you have - 3-bar menu > Add-ons > Themes/Extensions and restart Firefox again; now if it's OK, re-enable them one by one until you find the culprit. You may need to restart Firefox after enabling some extensions. Note: If you use userChrome.css - you don't have it if you don't know what it is, this is also disabled in Safe Mode, so should be regarded as an additional suspect, and can be disabled to test by placing /* before, and */ after the file in the chrome folder, then restarting Firefox.

I do not use userChrome.css.

Try a Clean Reinstall; this means you remove your Firefox program files and then reinstall Firefox. This process does not remove your Firefox profile data (such as bookmarks and passwords), since that information is stored in a different location. With Firefox closed, use another browser to download Firefox from https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/all/ and save the file to somewhere convenient on your computer. Now delete the Firefox installation folder which should be in one of the following locations - C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox You can now double click the file you previously downloaded to install Firefox.

See if your previous AV has a uninstall cleanup program available. Sometimes an uninstall leaves things behind (necessitating the vendor make such a cleanup application), and changes to Windows may not be reverted, causing issues since the AV is no longer handling the interactions in which it had previously inserted itself.

crankygoat said

See if your previous AV has a uninstall cleanup program available. Sometimes an uninstall leaves things behind (necessitating the vendor make such a cleanup application), and changes to Windows may not be reverted, causing issues since the AV is no longer handling the interactions in which it had previously inserted itself.

I downloaded and run the uninstall removal program, but the same problem exists.

In addition, I tried installing other brands of browsers, like Edge Chromium and Chrome, but the same issues persists: they run normally when I boot Windows 7 in Safe Mode, but once booting in Normal Mode these newest browsers refuse to load pages.

This sounds like a driver problem or similar - whether security software or something else, as no browser works outside safe mode.

You might do diagnostics using MSConfig, and disable, for example, non-Microsoft Services, or anything in the Startup tab, (on a separate attempt) to see if the issue persists. If you find the issue goes away, you can re-enable individual items in, say, groups of 4, in order to help narrow down the problematic item.

You can also use SFC /scannow command to see if any Windows files are corrupt or missing: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/929833/use-the-system-file-checker-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system

crankygoat said

This sounds like a driver problem or similar - whether security software or something else, as no browser works outside safe mode. You might do diagnostics using MSConfig, and disable, for example, non-Microsoft Services, or anything in the Startup tab, (on a separate attempt) to see if the issue persists. If you find the issue goes away, you can re-enable individual items in, say, groups of 4, in order to help narrow down the problematic item. You can also use SFC /scannow command to see if any Windows files are corrupt or missing: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/929833/use-the-system-file-checker-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system

I tried using the SFC scannow, but it said it couldn't find anything wrong. I also tried to disable as many services as possible using MSConfig, but even with minimal services running on Normal Mode it still fails to load pages in Mozilla, while it works just fine when booting in Safe Mode.

Anyways, using MSConfig I compared what minimal required services must be Started in order to boot in Safe Mode to those for booting in Normal Mode, and came up with the results below: DCOM Service Process Launcher: required in both Safe and Normal Modes Group Policy Client: required only in Normal Mode my antivirus software: required only in Normal Mode Plug and Play: required in both Safe and Normal Modes Remote Procedure Call (RPC): required in both Safe and Normal Modes RPC Endpoint Mapper: required in both Safe and Normal Modes Software Protection: required only in Normal Mode User Profile Service: required in both Safe and Normal Modes

Since the problem still persisted in Normal Mode after I uninstalled my antivirus software during with the antivirus service did not run, is it possible something linked to the services Group Policy Client and Software Protection are causing all these problems with Firefox 70s?

In addition, this week I am also seeing a lot of other users here reporting that they have the same problems I am getting when running Firefox 70s on a Windows 7 system, or using Windows 10 but opening Firefox 70s in Win 7 Compatibility Mode. Does this mean there's this irreparable bug when updating to the newest Firefox and trying to run it in a Windows 7 environment?

I have Firefox 73.0 32 bit as per the Help About on Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit. Only the menu and bookmarks toolbars display and only HELP works.

System restores brings FF back to life but it seems that FF update eventually causes this.

It will restart in safe mode but only the toolbar shows. Other browsers work fine.

Hate to be without FF ...

Hi, @rosebud101

What do you mean by "system restores". Do you mean System rollback, cancellation of some System updates?

Sorry, I should have stated using a restore point.

It seems to me that after rebooting to a previous state using a restore point that the ensuing FF updates may be the cause.

So you've got the same problem with NOT working FF ... or ... feel comfortable with working FF and System at the state before it's last updates? )) Thanks,

The FF updates are set to automatic since that is the default setting. I know as a fact that the first instance of this problem was associated with an incomplete/improper FF update.

The only way for me to use FF would be to go back to that same restore point and turn off automatic FF updates, which I suppose should make FF usable in an unrecommended way on my Windows 7 computer.

So I tried updating to Firefox 73.0.1, but it seems the exact same problem of none of the pages loading is still persisting.

Hi rosebud101, did yesterday's 73.0.1 update work on yours?

Hi CNCC, the patches in 73.0.1 address problems specific to 73.0, so since your problem goes back further, I'm not surprised it didn't work for you.

If I understand your issue:

• In Windows 7 "normal" mode, Firefox can't load any content and does not appear to even try.
• In Windows 7 "safe" mode (or safe mode with networking), Firefox works normally.

This suggests that one of your programs which runs at startup conflicts with Firefox. The difficult question is figuring out which one and how to remediate the problem if it's a program you want to continue running.

Although it's a bit like finding a needle in a haystack, the Microsoft utility Autoruns can help you start to track down the programs that are set to run automatically at startup/login:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/autoruns

If you haven't already, you also could look at the Applications log in the Event Viewer. This may list Firefox "crashes" for instances where a tab doesn't do anything, and sometimes will point to a third party module.

FF 73.01 installed correctly today and some add-ons updated. Now Firefox is back and working fine.

Was it a bad FF update?

Thank-you!

My version of not worked properly under the safe mode on Windows 10 (showed the same result as blank screen on the normal mode).

But started (back) to work normally after the applied updates. All the issues has resolved.

Note that we have recently seen multiple reports that Bitdefender is causing issues with tab crashes in Firefox 73.

If you use Bitdefender and suffer from this issue then try to uninstall this software.

• /questions/1280327 Firefox 73.0.1 was working fine, suddenly all new tabs "tab crash".

jscher2000 said

Hi CNCC, the patches in 73.0.1 address problems specific to 73.0, so since your problem goes back further, I'm not surprised it didn't work for you. If I understand your issue:

• In Windows 7 "normal" mode, Firefox can't load any content and does not appear to even try.
• In Windows 7 "safe" mode (or safe mode with networking), Firefox works normally.

This suggests that one of your programs which runs at startup conflicts with Firefox. The difficult question is figuring out which one and how to remediate the problem if it's a program you want to continue running. Although it's a bit like finding a needle in a haystack, the Microsoft utility Autoruns can help you start to track down the programs that are set to run automatically at startup/login: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/autoruns

The Autoruns seemed to have done the trick. After disabling everything and then enabling back whatever I needed to run one by one, my Firefox is working as it should be again.

Thanks for your help.