Firefox waiting on something...

[pentium]

This is driving me nuts.
I don't remember when it started but very often (at least twice every minute) firefox will simply hang, jump to 50% CPU usage, stay there for between seven and ten seconds and then unfreeze and return to normal.
If you were typing or clicking while the freeze occured, the keyboard buffer will dump itself into whatever you were typing into and things will start getting selected wildly (assuming you started randomly clicking stuff when you realized that the thing had hung again) the moment it unfreezes.
It also makes watching stuff on youtube or the likes unbearable.
I also see that at the time of the hang, firefox will eat up an additional thirty megs of ram or so but then promptly free it up as soon as it unhangs.
It sounds like a bug but nobody else seems to have it and after it persisting with a new version (not new install) of firefox I'm thinking something is messed but got no idea what

[weirdlookinguy]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

Got a wireless card in your system?

I had that exact problem on the downstairs XP box a few months back and moving the card to another slot fixed it.

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

All I got that is wireless is a USB bluetooth dongle.

[washu]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

Have any third party firewall and/or "Internet Security Suite" installed? Any anti-virus/anti-spyware that has some kind of "browser protection"? If so remove them. Don't disable, uninstall.

If that's not the case try the following in order.

1) Update Flash and possibly other plugins like Adobe Reader and Quicktime.
2) Uninstall above.
3) Uninstall any extensions one at a time and test.
4) Delete your Firefox profile. (backup first)
5) Full uninstall / re-install. Do 4 first.

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

Have any third party firewall and/or "Internet Security Suite" installed? Any anti-virus/anti-spyware that has some kind of "browser protection"? If so remove them. Don't disable, uninstall.

If that's not the case try the following in order.

1) Update Flash and possibly other plugins like Adobe Reader and Quicktime.
2) Uninstall above.
3) Uninstall any extensions one at a time and test.
4) Delete your Firefox profile. (backup first)
5) Full uninstall / re-install. Do 4 first.

Before I do anything....

I have absolutely no additional firewall/antivirus software installed. My firewall is the one that came with XP and my antivirus is Trend Micro's House call, which runs as either a java applet or flash program withing my internet browser.

1 - flash is up to date however I'm wondering why I should worry about those applications if they are not even running/being used

2 - I can do adobe reader as well as quicktime (I think) but how do I uninstall flash/shockwave?)

3 - I got quite a few extensions and for half of them, I don't know how to reinstall them.

4 - I have a firefox profile?

5 - That better be a last resort. if I uninstall I'll have to reconfigure everything all over again.

[washu]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

OK, so it's not likely anything firewall / security related. That's good. Still, check your add-ons for anything from Trend Micro (or any other AV) and try removing if there.

1. I mentioned flash because you had mentioned youtube as one site you have issues with. Also a lot of ads are flash based if you don't already have adblock/flashblock.

2. It should be in your add/remove programs. If that doesn't work google "flash uninstall" and you can get the uninstaller from Adobe.

3. You should be able to get any extensions from the official site which can be reached from the add-ons menu. If any of your extensions are not from the official site then I would suspect them the most.

4. Yep, it's where Firefox stores all your settings. It's in different locations depending on your OS version and there are two folders.

XP/2000: C:\Documents and Settings\%username%\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\%randomname%
AND
C:\Documents and Settings\%username%\Local Settings\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\%randomname%

Vista/7 C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\%randomname%
AND
C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\%randomname%


%randomname% is the name of your profile which is a bunch of random characters usually. Mine is "m3r513nj.default". If you have setup more than one profile there will be multiple directories, but it doesn't sound like you have.

I usually just backup then delete the two Mozilla directories a couple levels up.

Please be aware, this will delete all your settings and almost revert to a fresh install state. All bookmarks, extensions, etc will be gone if you delete these folders.

5. Yep, given that you would have to re-configure everything anyway if you get to 4 it's not likely you will need to do this. You can try doing an uninstall / reinstall without doing 4 and it should keep all your settings, but backup first if you do and I doubt it would help much.

[stj]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

it's probably a plugin going for data on the web.

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

Give me a while first. As expected with all my problematic hardware, the moment I prepare to rectify a problem the issue goes away. I'll browse for a few hours and see if it returns.

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

That was quick
If I leave firefox running, after a while the hang periods start to get longer and longer until I start to notice them. It feels like something is crashing, dumping and then restarting though I can't think of what would do that.

[washu]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

When the hanging starts how much RAM is Firefox using compared to your total physical?

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

My total physical?
Right now with all but my flash plugin disabled firefox uses about 111mb of ram. During a hang it will temporarily eat up between 30 and 60mb of additional ram but that's absolutely nothing considering I have three gigs of ram installed.

[washu]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

I meant how much physical RAM you have. Three gigs is plenty.

It could have been a problem if you had 256 or less and Firefox suddenly wanted more memory that your system couldn't give it quickly.

[kaniki]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

not sure if it is related but as soon as firefox upgraded this last time, it started acting funny here too. at times i would start it up, i would get a screen, then it would promptly just shut down. at other times I would try to start it, nothing, click the shortcut again, still nothing for a couple seconds, then the same with the popup and then nothing as it closes. I have a few addon's on mine and have seen them update from time to time and updated flash/shockwave players and have not seen it since.. so the whole player / add-on thing is a good possibility.

[pentium]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

Okay, I started messing with switching plugins and such on and off and I think I got it. There were two different versions of java installed and active, I disabled the older of the two and am waiting for the issues to happen. If nothing happens in the next while I think I found the issue.

[stj]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

you should only have one.

[kaniki]

Re: Firefox waiting on something...

you should only have one.

partly right.. if he has 2 installed in there, ill bet one is version 6 update xx and the other is a version say 5 or 4. I have seen many systems that do not remover the old version after installing a new one when it is on a different version level. Heck, if you check the older versions in the add remove programs, you can see 5 listings foir java. Version 3.o5 and then 3.07 and then 3.10.. you get the idea.. and then when you install version 4 or 5, it installes a hole new listing to the add remove programs.. When you install the new version (not update on the newest, but version) it leaves the older version on ther for backward capabilities, but most of the time, not needed. so it is not unheard of to have 2 versions of java installed.