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Firefox 21 memory leak! STILL!!!

  • 16 replies
  • 77 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by John99

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I recently installed FF21 on my Windows 7 machine and what a nightmare! I have NO addons or extensions other than what was installed with the original install. I can go to any website and I can recreate the problem - I also have Chrome installed and I do NOT get memory issues with that. The issue shows up mostly when scrolling up/down the page. I can watch the memory climbing until my system becomes unstable. I have looked at and tried the steps described on this site but to no avail. The about:memory page is nothing more than informational - the buttons do not resolve anything.

I recently installed FF21 on my Windows 7 machine and what a nightmare! I have NO addons or extensions other than what was installed with the original install. I can go to any website and I can recreate the problem - I also have Chrome installed and I do NOT get memory issues with that. The issue shows up mostly when scrolling up/down the page. I can watch the memory climbing until my system becomes unstable. I have looked at and tried the steps described on this site but to no avail. The about:memory page is nothing more than informational - the buttons do not resolve anything.

All Replies (16)

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Thx, but been there, done that.

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Boot the computer in Windows Safe mode with network support (press F8 on the boot screen) as a test to see if that helps.

Create a new profile as a test to check if your current profile is causing the problems.

See "Creating a profile":

If the new profile works then you can transfer some files from an existing profile to the new profile, but be careful not to copy corrupted files.

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I have this problem too

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I'm having all kinds of memory problems too, on my Mac, including the spinning wheel every few words I'm writing now. What a royal pain, I can't simply get around, write some things, view some videos, etc, without FF freezing, crashing, "pausing", and otherwise not functioning as a browser should! I've tried all the usual workarounds, and I'm about to just give up...

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same problem ever since i updated to 21 maybe even 20, but its been happening over the last 2-3 weeks ago. its very annoying, i thought it was my PC but then i noticed its only when i use firefox. i can play games for 3-5 hours just fine but as soon i use firefox for under and hour it will freeze once or twice every hour. Only plugin/addon i have installed is the latest Flashplayer, i even did a windows clean install to make sure it wast anything else. its definitely something with firefox.

Modified by XeoNoX

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I've had this stupid memory leak for a few months now. Please fix!!!! I'm running Mac Mountain Lion 10.8.3 and Firefox 22. I do not have any more add-ons than I've ever had, maybe six, and have been using Firefox for at least 12 years with similar add-ons and no problems until recently.

After FF has been open for awhile, I suddenly get the rainbow spinning wheel. I've learned to just simply give up and not try to keep using the browser -- I have to Quit FF and then re-launch it. That solves the problem but only until it does it again. Yesterday, I must have wasted 3-4 minutes trying to get the rainbow spinning wheel to even give me a drop-down menu so I could quit FF. Control-Q sometimes will do it but no better than trying to get the drop-down to quit. Twice yesterday I had to Force Quit FF from the Apple menu, it was so bad.

The problem has been helped very slightly by getting the download called MemoryFreer from ThinkTime Creations. I think it's only for Mac and was either free or a few bucks, but WAY worth it. BUT it still does NOT solve the memory leak problem, only delays it kicking in.

Please please Mozilla people, fix this problem.

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I've been having similar problems, but i recorded the memory during its expansion so the tech guys have a little more to work on. since they probably don't notice it on their fancy pants machines with 16Gbs of ram.

During this i had 4 Tabs open (including about:memory) but only was using 1 the whole time reading web comic on a rather sparse page with 2 help topics. (including this one) also i kept checking task manager in the background. when it hit ~750mb it started balooning in incremental spikes without interference before settling back down somewhere around 780MB Soon after while continuing to browse it began spiking again bringing with it this time visible spikes in CPU usage. Measuring using about:memory has become excruciating as it now takes several minutes and causes spiking. finally reached a full gigabyte in only a hour only browsing my web comic. this one i dumped a json and got the text numbers. just noticed the button. sorry 3=

after that i had to restart firefox due to constant freezing so i could post this.

Zip of text files of the memory from about:memory w/ the JSON file HERE

The GZ JSON in case zipping it caused any trouble HERE

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Hi Invader21,

I note from your the GZ JSON of the about:memory that a lot of memory seems to be allocated to to

I do not pretend to understand the technicalities of the memory problems but it does look like your comic sites could be hanging on to memory.

  • Does the memory use go down shortly after the comic tabs are closed ?
  • If not does it go down if you use the Free Memory buttons on the about memory page ?

It is also worth looking at about:compartments specifically look and see if there is anything listed under Ghost Windows

If you do have a reproducible problem we may be able to get someone to look into it.

May I however suggest you start your own thread about this because

  • this thread related to Firefox 21and your problem is with Firefox 23 or24.
  • and it is a thread started by someone else.
  • Please use this special, quick, direct link
    1. Please try to follow the prompts to provide troubleshooting information when you post.
    2. Post back here to confirm you have started a new thread.
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since it was the same size after i closed the tab, that means firefox is caching the site in RAM instead of on HDD. so that explains the leak. now, fix it Mozilla! move the cache to HDD from RAM after it reaches 1,000 MB

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Invader21,

now, fix it Mozilla!

It is just possible someone may try to help you if you start a new thread. Possibly it would be appropriate to file a bug.

Just asking here for fix will not however get a result. We are only fellow Firerfox users. It is unlikely developers will see any comments in this forum.

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this bug caused me to move onto Chrome browser, took me some getting used to but after about 3-5 days Chrome rox...pretty close to Firefox. i haven't looked back since.

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I'm forced to go to chrome, I'll miss Firefox with its much sleeker interface, dedicated search bar, and top notch community support. Filed a help ticket requesting this issue be fixed for the next major release (because as a dev I understand that this is some major retooling to change memory management methods). Until then I'm stuck with chrome (don't get me wrong, chrome isn't bad I just prefer Firefox)

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the skype click-to-call extension is known to cause huge memory leaks in firefox at the moment, so please keep the extension disabled or uninstall it from the windows control panel in case you have it present.

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Hi Invader21

If you have already filed a formal bug report at bugzilla please say what the number is of that bug, and very approximately when was it filed ?

If you have not yet filed a bug I suggest you start your own thread about this issue maybe there is a problem with the comic site, or maybe there is a problem with Firefox seen only on sites like that particular one.

Please use the link https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/new/desktop/fix-problems/form?search=Memory+Leak+%28%2Fquestions%2F960896%29&step=aaq-question

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Everyone,

We have very good reason* to suppose no major memory leak exists that is affecting a majority of Firefox users or even a large minority of users, other than those problems caused not directly by Firefox but by third party software or problem websites.

If you have problems we need full details not just me too comments. No one is denying you have a problem. Just that unless we know a lot more about your problem no one is going to be able to help you.


*

  • Telemetry,
  • Bug reporting,
  • Crash reporting,
  • This forum
  • And feedback comments

Should all help us to detect any large scale problem.