Firefox 82.0.3 freezes Windows 10 completely
Hello everyone,
I am new to this forum and driven here out of desperation for a remedy, having been a very happy Firefox user for about 15 years.
Windows specification Edition: Windows 10 Home Version: 2004 OS build: 19041.630 Experience: Windows Feature Experience Pack 120.2212.31.0
Problem - Firefox 82.0.3 freezes Windows 10 completely, disabling mouse and keyboard and requiring hard reboot. (The longest I waited before reboot was 15 minutes.) - Freeze can be after some minutes of Firefox runtime or on startup. - This is browsing simple information websites - nothing graphics- or streaming-heavy. Vanilla Firefox - no add ons or customization. Freezes have been on mouse click, but also not. - Starting Firefox in Safe Mode makes no difference. - Uninstall and reinstall remedied the situation for a number of hours before freezes began again. When freezes were uniformly on startup, I uninstalled again. And that's where I am... using Chrome. :(
My hunch is that this is to do with the Refresh of Firefox I did the day before the first freeze. I had noticed the "Firefox seems to be slow to load..." message (with the tortoise) at the bottom of Firefox for a month or two, ignoring it because I wasn't finding it unduly slow. I must have used Firefox for a total of about 4 hours after the Refresh before the first freeze.
All assistance gratefully received.
Huw
Chosen solution
The plot has thickened... and not a in a good way. :/
I decided to reinstall Firefox with the intention of then running Profile Manager with Firefox closed (Win+R firefox.exe -p).
At the start of install I wasn't sure what "Restore default settings and remove old add-ons for optimal performance" meant so I left it checked. "Now installing" was completed. "The following items were successfully imported" (I think it said bookmarks, history etc) went by. Then it showed "Almost done". And that is where the machine froze. I waited 20 mins and then hard rebooted.
I found: - A Firefox icon on the desktop, it would not run (nothing happens). - In addition Mozilla Firefox was not listed in Settings/Apps and features so I could not uninstall.
Following Eve's train of thought (above) it seems reasonable to suggest that the starting point of my issue was the Refresh that either caused or exacerbated a file corruption (perhaps in the Profile). When you uninstall Firefox, it appears that not all elements are cleaned from the machine - when I have reinstalled it said something like "We have detected that you have previously installed Firefox on this computer". It seems reasonable to suggest that my uninstalls and reinstalls may have further corrupted the legacy situation that the new install is interacting with so that now the reinstall is failing. I am blocked.
I think what I need now is a recipe for removing Firefox completely MANUALLY.
I have found this: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1067843. Support from jscher2000 and FredMcD.
Following jscher2000's instructions, I successfully ran helper.exe in the uninstall folder in C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox.
Now I have paused. I see the following: 1. In the Program folder there is no C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox folder any more. 2. But there is a C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Maintenance Service folder. 3. In the Main and Temp Settings folders (%APPDATA%\Mozilla and %LOCALAPPDATA%\Mozilla) there are some folders including 4 Profiles folders in the Firefox folder. Also Crash Reports.
Can I please get some reassurance that I should now delete the folders listed in 2 and 3 in the list above?
And finally, if I do that, how important are the registry fragments that jscher2000 says will linger? I have used regedit in the dim and distant past, so if there is a shopping list of what to remove, I would be up for having a go at that for a clean start.
Sorry for the long post, but your expert replies to these questions would be very helpful. :)
Huw
Read this answer in context 👍 0All Replies (5)
This is if you're on any website, you said simple websites. Does it seem to crop up ALWAYS after a few minutes?
Strange that refreshing fixes it temporarily, but not permanently. Try making a second profile, maybe something is messed up with the first one you're using (that you likely are using again after refreshing it).
Try also, Developer Firefox or Nightly Firefox and see if the issue crops up there too: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/channel/desktop/ DEVELOPER EDITION: (+1 version number) https://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-devedition-stub&os=win&lang=en-US NIGHTLY EDITION: (+2 version number) https://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-nightly-stub&os=win&lang=en-US
Hi Eve,
To be clear: I haven't done a Refresh since the problem started. I did an uninstall/reinstall. And, as I say, all was good for a number of hours before the freezes started again. When I had seen 3 freezes on Firefox startup in a row I gave up and uninstalled - that's where I am now.
I don't know what a "profile" is or how to make one, but would expect the uninstall/reinstall to reset everything clean. I did import HTML bookmarks but I am guessing that is a different thing.
All best,
Huw
Gotcha. I misread, sorry about that.
This article details how to change or make new profiles to try and narrow down the freezing to maybe being related to your current profile: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-remove-switch-firefox-profiles
Thanks Eve,
I don't have Profile Manager because I have uninstalled Firefox. Are you suggesting that a corrupt profile might be lying around somewhere? Can I delete it manually? I've looked in c:\program files\ and c:\program files (x86) and there is no Mozilla or Firefox folder there. Or is it best to reinstall Firefox and use the Profile Manager?
Huw :)
Chosen Solution
The plot has thickened... and not a in a good way. :/
I decided to reinstall Firefox with the intention of then running Profile Manager with Firefox closed (Win+R firefox.exe -p).
At the start of install I wasn't sure what "Restore default settings and remove old add-ons for optimal performance" meant so I left it checked. "Now installing" was completed. "The following items were successfully imported" (I think it said bookmarks, history etc) went by. Then it showed "Almost done". And that is where the machine froze. I waited 20 mins and then hard rebooted.
I found: - A Firefox icon on the desktop, it would not run (nothing happens). - In addition Mozilla Firefox was not listed in Settings/Apps and features so I could not uninstall.
Following Eve's train of thought (above) it seems reasonable to suggest that the starting point of my issue was the Refresh that either caused or exacerbated a file corruption (perhaps in the Profile). When you uninstall Firefox, it appears that not all elements are cleaned from the machine - when I have reinstalled it said something like "We have detected that you have previously installed Firefox on this computer". It seems reasonable to suggest that my uninstalls and reinstalls may have further corrupted the legacy situation that the new install is interacting with so that now the reinstall is failing. I am blocked.
I think what I need now is a recipe for removing Firefox completely MANUALLY.
I have found this: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1067843. Support from jscher2000 and FredMcD.
Following jscher2000's instructions, I successfully ran helper.exe in the uninstall folder in C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox.
Now I have paused. I see the following: 1. In the Program folder there is no C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox folder any more. 2. But there is a C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Maintenance Service folder. 3. In the Main and Temp Settings folders (%APPDATA%\Mozilla and %LOCALAPPDATA%\Mozilla) there are some folders including 4 Profiles folders in the Firefox folder. Also Crash Reports.
Can I please get some reassurance that I should now delete the folders listed in 2 and 3 in the list above?
And finally, if I do that, how important are the registry fragments that jscher2000 says will linger? I have used regedit in the dim and distant past, so if there is a shopping list of what to remove, I would be up for having a go at that for a clean start.
Sorry for the long post, but your expert replies to these questions would be very helpful. :)
Huw