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Firefox contantly hangs, can't End Process and have to reboot

  • 30 replies
  • 96 have this problem
  • 10 views
  • Last reply by conlon

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Why can't firefox.exe be killed in Windows? I'm getting daily crashes in FF5, and jusding by thousands of posts so are others. I could live with these IF Windows allowed me to End Process, but it does not. I've even tried to end firefox.exe at the command line against the PID, but despite saying it had been teminated it has not. Having to close all my work and reboot Windows every time FF decides to longer work is VERY frustrating!!

Why can't firefox.exe be killed in Windows? I'm getting daily crashes in FF5, and jusding by thousands of posts so are others. I could live with these IF Windows allowed me to End Process, but it does not. I've even tried to end firefox.exe at the command line against the PID, but despite saying it had been teminated it has not. Having to close all my work and reboot Windows every time FF decides to longer work is VERY frustrating!!

Modified by redactuk

All Replies (20)

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Hang at Exit

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Firefox%20hangs#w_hang-at-exit

Check and tell if its working.

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This is a Windows operating system issue which has been fixed in Service Pack 3.

According to your system specs, you haven't installed that yet, so you first port of call should be the Windows Update site.

After you install SP3, go back to the Windows Update site again and install all the latest patches.

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that was an error on my part, I already have SP3

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Well I've tried advice given. After browsing for 10 minutes with no extensions or add-ons, it crashed again, and had to reboot as i could not kill process.

Quite honestly I've had enough. I've now spent last 1/2 hour setting up Chrome, and I will use that until some time in the future Firefox can get their act together. Over the last 2-3 years FF has just got slower and slower and more and more buggy, with FF4 and FF5 just being a joke to be honest.

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did you performed the steps suggested in the article in my previous post ??

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Well i still need FF on my PC to test web apps, so today I completely uninstalled FF and every single trace of it and every plugin from the registry, then re-installed 5.01. Starting browing and about 5 minutes later it hangs.

So my question in reply to mha is tried what exactly? My issue is FF seems to randomly hang while browing new sites that have been opened in new tabs. According to the article you posted this is a known issue since 2004 that is still not resolved in FF5!

Can someone tell me is there a log which maybe indicates that last thing that FF does before it hangs?

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Getting help with your Crash

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Firefox%20crashes#w_getting-help-with-your-crash

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I said 'hang' not crash. There are no crash reports listed

Modified by redactuk

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Firefox Hangs

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Firefox%20hangs

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Are you using Firefox 5.0 or Firefox 5.1? Lots of people have this problem with 5.0 but when they update to 5.1 this seems to become less of a problem.

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Read above... 5.1

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mha007 seriously... if you can't post anything consutructive then don't post!!

I've read those documents and I've already referred to them above i.e. my situation is that it hangs randomly any time within first few minutes of usage.

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-> click Firefox button and click Exit

-> Start Firefox in Safe Mode (switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox (Tools) > Add-ons > Appearance/Themes).

https://support.mozilla.com/kb/Safe+Mode

Firefox Safe Mode window will open. DON'T SELECT ANY OPTIONS, just click Continue in Safe Mode

-> The problem does not occur in Safe Mode

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Troubleshooting%20extensions%20and%20themes#w_the-problem-does-not-occur-in-safe-mode

-> The problem still occurs in Safe Mode

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Modified by Hasan

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Well I'm at a loss. I've followed above links. Problem is that it will work fine often for anywhere between 1 minutes and 2 hours and then suddenly hang for no reason. I've run safemode for an hour or so and it was fine. I re-added Firebug (my only extension and it also rank fine for hours then hung. How long Am I supposed to run in safe mode? days? If Firebuf was the issue why would it run for hours fine the hang?

I thought maybe there wasa issue with Flash Player, so re-installed that, but makes no difference. Anyway.. back to my original topic.....

WHY WHY WHY unlike most other windows apps can't I End Process for Firefox when it hangs? Having to reboot my machine every time it hangs is far more annoying than FF hanging itself. If Firefox process could be killed like any other process I could live with a hang every few hours. PLEASE PLEASE can Firefox team do something to allow it easy to terminate FF when issues occur without it locking your profiole or whatever else it is that prevents a 2nd application from being loaded.

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Tried killing firefox process at command line. I've even downloaded pskill from MS site and even that won't kill it. pskill just sits there hogging 99% of cpu trying to kill firefox process.

Modified by redactuk

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Are you Now seeing any Crash Reports when you type about:crashes in URL bar and hit Enter ??

If not then,

-> Tap ALT key or press F10 to show the Menu Bar

-> go to Tools Menu -> Options -> Advanced -> General -> place Checkmark on Submit Crash Reports

-> Click OK on Options window. The next time Firefox Crashes, maybe it will save the Crash Report.

Your operating system's system log may also have a crash report. The information will probably include the name of the module that caused the crash. On recent Windows versions, go to Start > Settings > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Event Viewer. In the application tab, right-click on the event and select Properties. When you report the event, you should copy the information from the log.

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Modified by Hasan

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No crash reports from either Firefrox or Windows. Basically I can be browsing websites either via a single tab or multiple tabs and suddenly it appears to be waiting to load the next websites. At this point FF will not do anything else and when I close it I cannot re-open again or end the process. No crash reports and no indication of why it suddenly stopped. Other browser makes working fine, no other reported issues in Windows logs. At this point the only way to get FF back is to reboot.

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-> Create a New Profile as a test to check if your current profile is causing the problems. See:

Basic Troubleshooting - Make a New Profile

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Basic%20Troubleshooting#w_8-make-a-new-profile

-> If that New Profile works then you can recover your Bookmarks and Passwords from the Old Profile. See this:

Recovering important data from an old profile

https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Recovering%20important%20data%20from%20an%20old%20profile

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I did that already when I re-installed 5.01 from scratch. When I installed from scratch I only imported bookmarls from an HTML export. Nothing else was carried over from my old profile.

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Do a clean (re-)install:

-> Download a fresh Firefox copy and save the file to the desktop.

-> Uninstall your current Firefox version and Remove the Firefox Program Files folder

  • Do not remove personal data if you uninstall the current version.
  • It is important to delete the Firefox Program Files folder to Remove all the files and make sure that there are no problems with files that were leftover after Uninstalling.

-> Install Firefox from the saved Firefox installer

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