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High memory usage on firefox process if it is left idle

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  • Last reply by a_nice_guy

a_nice_guy
a_nice_guy
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Basically I'm already used to high memory usage by Firefox - 300-400 MB is normal for me.

However, after upgrading to FF4 RC, I got very big problem with memory usage: if I leave FF running idle for long time, it eats up a lot more memory than usual. During the night it had taken 2.6 GB! On another occasion it took only 1.5 hour for FF to eat up 1,6 GB although it started only with some 350 MB.

Also, I've checked memory usage with 'procexp.exe' for firefox process and saw that once I refresh some pages (let's say about:memory) couple of times after some period of inactivity, memory usages normalizes (goes from ~700 MB to some ~400 MB).

Another situation is where memory usage graph looks like zig-zag (memory goes from 300 MB to 450 MB in ~8 min and then goes back to normal; repeat). Actually this was happening while I wrote this problem description.

So anyone? Have you the same problem? Can you point me in right direction to solve this? Or should head to bugzilla to file a bug?

Basically I'm already used to high memory usage by Firefox - 300-400 MB is normal for me. However, after upgrading to FF4 RC, I got very big problem with memory usage: if I leave FF running idle for long time, it eats up a lot more memory than usual. During the night it had taken 2.6 GB! On another occasion it took only 1.5 hour for FF to eat up 1,6 GB although it started only with some 350 MB. Also, I've checked memory usage with 'procexp.exe' for firefox process and saw that once I refresh some pages (let's say about:memory) couple of times after some period of inactivity, memory usages normalizes (goes from ~700 MB to some ~400 MB). Another situation is where memory usage graph looks like zig-zag (memory goes from 300 MB to 450 MB in ~8 min and then goes back to normal; repeat). Actually this was happening while I wrote this problem description. So anyone? Have you the same problem? Can you point me in right direction to solve this? Or should head to bugzilla to file a bug?

All Replies (2)

cor-el
cor-el
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  • Top 10 Contributor
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Start Firefox in Diagnose Firefox issues using Troubleshoot Mode to check if one of the add-ons is causing the problem (switch to the DEFAULT theme: Tools > Add-ons > Themes).

  • Don't make any changes on the Safe mode start window.

See:

a_nice_guy
a_nice_guy Question owner
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Safe mode did not help. I have disabled ALL extensions and plug-ins, but the problem with "zig-zag" memory usage still remains (I've not tried to leave browser open for the night yet).

I think I'll do clean reinstall with completely new empty profile (without sync'ed information) to try this out. If this works, I'll start adding stuff (configuration, sync, features, etc) to see what causes the problem.