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FireFox going Crazy

astral

By astral
in IT and Computers

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astral Star Member

astral

Posted
Posted

This afternoon I realised my laptop was getting very hot.

The internal fan was running and it sits on a cooling pad with 3 fans to assist the airflow.

When I did Ctrl+Alt+Delete I found the cpu was running at 100% solid

and the culprit was FireFox 3.6.12

I killed the process and things dropped back to normal.

FF is running again now, with 6 windows open, 22% cpu usage

and 182.864K of memory grabbed by FF

Now I do have a few addons installed, but nothing that has changed recently

as far as I know.

Any suggestions as I do not want to kill the machine with heat. :bah:

Thanks

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BB1950 Gold Member

BB1950

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I am amazed that with the CPU running at 100% you were able to open the task manager. In my experience if some process is using the CPU at 100%, the computer appears locked and you can't do anything. It's usually the result of of errant code. Scripts are code that is executing within a webpage or addons.. Adobe flash player uses scripts to display the media and is frequently subject to bad code and Trojans. That's why it is important to keep Adobe Flash player, Java, and your browser updated to the latest versions.

The figures:

FF is running again now, with 6 windows open, 22% cpu usage

and 182.864K of memory grabbed by FF

are not unreasonable.

If it was a one time event of Firefox using 100% CPU, then it will be extremely difficult to determine what caused it. It could have been a errant addon, webpage, hard drive, or some other hardware problem. Think of Firefox as an operating system within an operating system.

If it continues to happen, you need to isolate it more. Does it happen with a particular web page? What are you doing when it happens? If you run Firefox in Safe Mode can you replicate the problem? If not, then you may have a problem with an addon or profile. Methodically disable extensions to determine if a particular addon is causing the problem or create a new profile and add your extensions to it to determine if your profile was corrupted.

Do a Google search for "troubleshoot flash player" and "troubleshoot firefox" for more information on how to isolate your problem.

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BB1950 Gold Member

BB1950

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how do I kill scripts when the system is not responding ?

If you can't access the Task Manager with the [Ctrl] [Alt] [Del] keys pressed at the same time to end the Firefox process, your only choice is to reset/restart the computer.

Remember to be patient and wait for several minutes to see if you were able to open the open the Task Manager before attempting a reset/restart. It may take some time.

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ronz28 Gold Member

ronz28

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You could go here to see if you have the latest flash player update

http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/

and here to check settings at the website storage panel, etc. and delete any unwanted junk a website may have loaded onto your computer

http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager07.html

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astral Star Member

astral

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Thanks for all your help and suggestions

You could go here to see if you have the latest flash player update

http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/

Trying that at the moment, but do not like the way it sneaked on McAfee Security scanner as well. :bah:

.....check settings at the website storage panel, etc. and delete any unwanted junk a website may have loaded onto your computer

http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager07.html

Virtually clean, I am please to say.

I do have the NoScript addon, but had turned it off when I had another problem.

It goes back on asap. :thumbsup:

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dddave Platinum Member

dddave

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Ironically, I often have similar problems when i am on THAI-VISA; like just now when I hit the "reply" button, my hard drive spun for about two minutes before the reply window came up. Also, frequently (like just now as I typed "frequently") the cursor lags for up to 5 or 6 seconds before what I typed appears.

Often, when I am browsing T.V., it locks up for minutes at a time.

I am using FIREFOX on a old desktop with XP and 512K memory.

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astral Star Member

astral

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I am using FIREFOX on a old desktop with XP and 512K memory.

512K memory is not really enough.

Cntl+Alt+Delete and click performance to see how much memory is in use.

All 512K is my guess.

An extra 512K stick in the machine could work wonders.

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siamect Silver Member

siamect

Posted
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I am using FIREFOX on a old desktop with XP and 512K memory.

512K memory is not really enough.

Cntl+Alt+Delete and click performance to see how much memory is in use.

All 512K is my guess.

An extra 512K stick in the machine could work wonders.

My computer at work is a 1G RAM and it is WinXP, professionally maintained by our IT department in Switzerland.

It has the same problem with Thaivisa.com and other websites.

It also has a number of other performance problems... but usually when everything is standing still the task manager shows no excessive memory use and most of the time the cpu is on the lower 10% on both cores... I have seen this on other computers as well...

Martin

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BB1950 Gold Member

BB1950

Posted
Posted (edited)

Are there better alternatives for Adobe Flashplayer, like Foxit Reader is way better then Adobe Reader ?

I wish there was. I've never been a fan of Adobe. If you do a Google search for flash player alternatives, you see the question asked again and again... with no answers. Even Microsoft's Silverlight Player requires Adobe's Flash Player to play the media.

Edited by BB1950
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bangkokcitylimits Gold Member

bangkokcitylimits

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Are there better alternatives for Adobe Flashplayer, like Foxit Reader is way better then Adobe Reader ?

I wish there was. I've never been a fan of Adobe. If you do a Google search for flash player alternatives, you see the question asked again and again... with no answers. Even Microsoft's Silverlight Player requires Adobe's Flash Player to play the media.

http://alternativeto.net/software/flash-player/

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astral Star Member

astral

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Following the suggestions here I upgraded Adobe Flash to the latest version,

mind you I had to go via IE to download the FF version. :bah:

Within an hour I was getting a message to say I needed to upgrade my Adobe Flash..........

What kind of sw is this???????? :angry:

I have also reactivated NoScript.

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  • 1 month later...
jobsworth Advanced Member

jobsworth

Posted
Posted

I have a theory that this problem is due to a slower internet connection in Thailand.

Firefox was developed by a network of people but mostly in the USA

where they do not see how it runs if there is a hiccup in the internet connection.

I notice many times on many different web sites that firefox and the machine just sit there for a while doing nothing

just waiting to receive a few more packets.

Wink wink on the router and everything returns to normal.

I am sorry to say that IE8 is slightly better and does not do this so much.

The software should be written so that firefox does not consume 100% of the cpu

while it is waiting for the internet.

It should sleep for a little bit and check every say 5 seconds - (polling rather than interrupting?).

Of course since firefox is open source you could always rewrite it yourself to do exactly that.

Well someone can. I am not that clever. It is irritating.

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