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Firefox freezes when handling tabs

  • 17 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by OwnSauce

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Hello everyone. Since installing Linux Mint in May 2023 I have been having this issue with Firefox.

Description of issue: When I switch between (or drag) tabs in a Firefox window, the whole window becomes unresponsive, with the last tab I was switching from still in front. Often the contents of the window start to flash (disappear and reappear, leaving a black backgground) every 2 seconds. I can drag the window around, scroll, minimize it, but it is impossible to give any input in any tab. The only action somewhat possible to do inside the window is bring other tabs in front, it is still quite hard for the input to register, and if it does, it takes 10+ seconds. The issue goes away if I close the specific Firefox window, or if I manage to select and drag one tab out of the frozen window into its own new window. Then everything works as intended, like nothing ever happened.

I can reliably cause the freeze-up in a short time by holding CTRL+TAB and drag one tab to change the order while firefox cycles through the tabs in the open window.

While the window is frozen, the rest of the desktop is responsive as normal, even other Firefox windows. If I try to interact with the frozen window I can rarely see spikes of CPU usage. RAM stays at normal usage levels, far from being full.

What I have tried so far that has had no effect on the appearance of the issue:

1) Disabling all extensions i have

2) Run in troubleshooting mode

2) "Create a new places database" as suggested [https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-hangs-or-not-responding#w_fi...]

3) Disabled hardware acceleration

4) Creaing a new firefox user profile

5) Use "Refresh Firefox" from the troubleshooting page

6) Use the Flatpak version of firefox

7) Reinstall firefox

Here is my system information

here

Hello everyone. Since installing Linux Mint in May 2023 I have been having this issue with Firefox. Description of issue: When I switch between (or drag) tabs in a Firefox window, the whole window becomes unresponsive, with the last tab I was switching from still in front. Often the contents of the window start to flash (disappear and reappear, leaving a black backgground) every 2 seconds. I can drag the window around, scroll, minimize it, but it is impossible to give any input in any tab. The only action somewhat possible to do inside the window is bring other tabs in front, it is still quite hard for the input to register, and if it does, it takes 10+ seconds. The issue goes away if I close the specific Firefox window, or if I manage to select and drag one tab out of the frozen window into its own new window. Then everything works as intended, like nothing ever happened. I can reliably cause the freeze-up in a short time by holding CTRL+TAB and drag one tab to change the order while firefox cycles through the tabs in the open window. While the window is frozen, the rest of the desktop is responsive as normal, even other Firefox windows. If I try to interact with the frozen window I can rarely see spikes of CPU usage. RAM stays at normal usage levels, far from being full. What I have tried so far that has had no effect on the appearance of the issue: 1) Disabling all extensions i have 2) Run in troubleshooting mode 2) "Create a new places database" as suggested [[https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-hangs-or-not-responding#w_firefox-hangs-at-random-times|here]] 3) Disabled hardware acceleration 4) Creaing a new firefox user profile 5) Use "Refresh Firefox" from the troubleshooting page 6) Use the Flatpak version of firefox 7) Reinstall firefox Here is my system information [https://ufile.io/6ntf78xm here]

Chosen solution

Try changing nglayout.enable_drag_images to false in about:config.

Read this answer in context 👍 3

All Replies (17)

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(supplement) The only change which seems to make the issue go away is to change nvidia driver to the 390 version (see in the image).

It's impossible to be sure of the "disappearance" judging only from observed behaviour. But I am pretty confident it makes a difference. I tried to trigger the issue with an effort that would ensure some 10 episodes with the other drivers.

I have no clue why that would make a difference, I don't want to be misleading but this is what I observe.

It is not a desirable solution anyway because with the 390 driver my pc cannot automatically switch to the dedicated gpu. I have to change my nvidia-prime settings and restart every time I want to switch from integrated and dedicated graphics.

Any advice would be very welcome. at the moment the only thing I can think of is reinstall the whole OS.

Modified by nico.venuti

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What Desktop? X11 or Wayland? Try downloading Firefox from Mozilla. Download, unzip, and run firefox-bin from the folder and see if you have the same issue. https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/all/#product-desktop-release You can also try openSUSE Tumbleweed.  ;-))

Can we get similar sysinfo?

Operating System: openSUSE Tumbleweed 20231213 KDE Plasma Version: 5.27.10 KDE Frameworks Version: 5.112.0 Qt Version: 5.15.11 Kernel Version: 6.6.6-1-default (64-bit) Graphics Platform: X11 Processors: 12 × Intel® Core™ i7-9850H CPU @ 2.60GHz Memory: 125.1 GiB of RAM Graphics Processor: Mesa Intel® UHD Graphics 630 Manufacturer: HP Product Name: HP ZBook 17 G6

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Thank you for the reply. I had tried to link a file with my system info but I see now the hosting website is not as reliable as I thought it was. I'm just going to paste it here:

``` System:

 Kernel: 5.15.0-91-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.4.0
   Desktop: MATE 1.26.0 info: mate-panel wm: marco 1.26.0 vt: 7
   dm: LightDM 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 21.1 Vera base: Ubuntu 22.04 jammy

Machine:

 Type: Laptop System: Acer product: Swift SF315-51G v: V1.05
   serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <superuser required>
 Mobo: KBL model: Budweiser_KL v: V1.05 serial: <superuser required>
   UEFI: Insyde v: 1.05 date: 11/28/2017

Battery:

 ID-1: BAT0 charge: 7.8 Wh (20.7%) condition: 37.6/48.9 Wh (76.8%)
   volts: 14.5 min: 15.2 model: AC14B8K type: Li-ion serial: N/A
   status: Discharging

Memory:

 RAM: total: 7.63 GiB used: 2.32 GiB (30.4%)
 RAM Report:
   permissions: Unable to run dmidecode. Root privileges required.

CPU:

 Info: quad core model: Intel Core i5-8250U bits: 64 type: MT MCP
   smt: enabled arch: Coffee Lake rev: A cache: L1: 256 KiB L2: 1024 KiB
   L3: 6 MiB
 Speed (MHz): avg: 899 high: 900 min/max: 400/3400 cores: 1: 900 2: 900
   3: 900 4: 898 5: 900 6: 900 7: 900 8: 900 bogomips: 28800
 Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx

Graphics:

 Device-1: Intel UHD Graphics 620 vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI driver: i915
   v: kernel ports: active: eDP-1 empty: HDMI-A-1 bus-ID: 00:02.0
   chip-ID: 8086:5917 class-ID: 0300
 Device-2: NVIDIA GP108M [GeForce MX150] vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI
   driver: nvidia v: 525.147.05 pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 4 bus-ID: 01:00.0
   chip-ID: 10de:1d10 class-ID: 0302
 Device-3: Realtek HD WebCam type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 1-7:3
   chip-ID: 0bda:5621 class-ID: 0e02 serial: <filter>
 Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.4 compositor: marco v: 1.26.0
   driver: X: loaded: modesetting,nvidia unloaded: fbdev,nouveau,vesa
   gpu: i915 display-ID: :0 screens: 1
 Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x286mm (20.0x11.3")
   s-diag: 583mm (23")
 Monitor-1: eDP-1 model: Chi Mei Innolux res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 142
   size: 344x193mm (13.5x7.6") diag: 394mm (15.5") modes: 1920x1080
 OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel UHD Graphics 620 (KBL GT2)
   v: 4.6 Mesa 23.0.4-0ubuntu1~22.04.1 direct render: Yes

Audio:

 Device-1: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI
   driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:9d71
   class-ID: 0403
 Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.15.0-91-generic running: yes
 Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 15.99.1 running: yes
 Sound Server-3: PipeWire v: 0.3.48 running: yes

Network:

 Device-1: Intel Wireless 7265 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel pcie:
   speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:095a class-ID: 0280
 IF: wlp3s0 state: up mac: <filter>

Bluetooth:

 Device-1: Intel Bluetooth wireless interface type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8
   bus-ID: 1-6:2 chip-ID: 8087:0a2a class-ID: e001
 Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 3 state: down
   bt-service: enabled,running rfk-block: hardware: no software: yes
   address: <filter>

RAID:

 Hardware-1: Intel 82801 Mobile SATA Controller [RAID mode] driver: ahci
   v: 3.0 port: 4060 bus-ID: 00:17.0 chip-ID: 8086:282a rev: N/A
   class-ID: 0104

Drives:

 Local Storage: total: 238.47 GiB used: 91.58 GiB (38.4%)
 ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Intel model: SSDPEKKW256G7 size: 238.47 GiB
   speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD serial: <filter> rev: PSF121C
   temp: 20.9 C scheme: GPT

Partition:

 ID-1: / size: 23.74 GiB used: 19.94 GiB (84.0%) fs: ext4
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p5
 ID-2: /boot/efi size: 96 MiB used: 31.1 MiB (32.3%) fs: vfat
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1
 ID-3: /home size: 182.12 GiB used: 71.61 GiB (39.3%) fs: ext4
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p3

Swap:

 ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 7.81 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p7

Sensors:

 System Temperatures: cpu: 39.0 C pch: 35.5 C mobo: N/A
 Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A

Repos:

 Packages: 3010 apt: 3001 flatpak: 9
 No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mono-official-stable.list
   1: deb https://download.mono-project.com/repo/ubuntu stable-bionic main
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
   1: deb http://packages.linuxmint.com vera main upstream import backport
   2: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy main restricted universe multiverse
   3: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-updates main restricted universe multiverse
   4: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-backports main restricted universe multiverse
   5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ jammy-security main restricted universe multiverse
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/skype-stable.list
   1: deb [arch=amd64] https://repo.skype.com/deb stable main
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/sublime-text.list
   1: deb https://download.sublimetext.com/ apt/stable/

Info:

 Processes: 288 Uptime: 58m wakeups: 1 Init: systemd v: 249 runlevel: 5
 Compilers: gcc: 11.4.0 alt: 11/12 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.16
 running-in: mate-terminal inxi: 3.3.13

```

The firefox version available to download on Mozilla's website seems to be the same version I already have (120.0.1). I'll try to install it and let you know how it works

Modified by nico.venuti

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(I had already written posted this reply, but then I edited the message to fixed a sentence and it disappeared from the thread. I am posting it again)

Thank you for the reply. Here is my system info: ``` System:

 Kernel: 5.15.0-91-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.4.0
   Desktop: MATE 1.26.0 info: mate-panel wm: marco 1.26.0 vt: 7
   dm: LightDM 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 21.1 Vera base: Ubuntu 22.04 jammy

Machine:

 Type: Laptop System: Acer product: Swift SF315-51G v: V1.05
   serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <superuser required>
 Mobo: KBL model: Budweiser_KL v: V1.05 serial: <superuser required>
   UEFI: Insyde v: 1.05 date: 11/28/2017

Battery:

 ID-1: BAT0 charge: 7.8 Wh (20.7%) condition: 37.6/48.9 Wh (76.8%)
   volts: 14.5 min: 15.2 model: AC14B8K type: Li-ion serial: N/A
   status: Discharging

Memory:

 RAM: total: 7.63 GiB used: 2.32 GiB (30.4%)
 RAM Report:
   permissions: Unable to run dmidecode. Root privileges required.

CPU:

 Info: quad core model: Intel Core i5-8250U bits: 64 type: MT MCP
   smt: enabled arch: Coffee Lake rev: A cache: L1: 256 KiB L2: 1024 KiB
   L3: 6 MiB
 Speed (MHz): avg: 899 high: 900 min/max: 400/3400 cores: 1: 900 2: 900
   3: 900 4: 898 5: 900 6: 900 7: 900 8: 900 bogomips: 28800
 Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx

Graphics:

 Device-1: Intel UHD Graphics 620 vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI driver: i915
   v: kernel ports: active: eDP-1 empty: HDMI-A-1 bus-ID: 00:02.0
   chip-ID: 8086:5917 class-ID: 0300
 Device-2: NVIDIA GP108M [GeForce MX150] vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI
   driver: nvidia v: 525.147.05 pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 4 bus-ID: 01:00.0
   chip-ID: 10de:1d10 class-ID: 0302
 Device-3: Realtek HD WebCam type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 1-7:3
   chip-ID: 0bda:5621 class-ID: 0e02 serial: <filter>
 Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.4 compositor: marco v: 1.26.0
   driver: X: loaded: modesetting,nvidia unloaded: fbdev,nouveau,vesa
   gpu: i915 display-ID: :0 screens: 1
 Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x286mm (20.0x11.3")
   s-diag: 583mm (23")
 Monitor-1: eDP-1 model: Chi Mei Innolux res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 142
   size: 344x193mm (13.5x7.6") diag: 394mm (15.5") modes: 1920x1080
 OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel UHD Graphics 620 (KBL GT2)
   v: 4.6 Mesa 23.0.4-0ubuntu1~22.04.1 direct render: Yes

Audio:

 Device-1: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI
   driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:9d71
   class-ID: 0403
 Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.15.0-91-generic running: yes
 Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 15.99.1 running: yes
 Sound Server-3: PipeWire v: 0.3.48 running: yes

Network:

 Device-1: Intel Wireless 7265 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel pcie:
   speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:095a class-ID: 0280
 IF: wlp3s0 state: up mac: <filter>

Bluetooth:

 Device-1: Intel Bluetooth wireless interface type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8
   bus-ID: 1-6:2 chip-ID: 8087:0a2a class-ID: e001
 Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 3 state: down
   bt-service: enabled,running rfk-block: hardware: no software: yes
   address: <filter>

RAID:

 Hardware-1: Intel 82801 Mobile SATA Controller [RAID mode] driver: ahci
   v: 3.0 port: 4060 bus-ID: 00:17.0 chip-ID: 8086:282a rev: N/A
   class-ID: 0104

Drives:

 Local Storage: total: 238.47 GiB used: 91.58 GiB (38.4%)
 ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Intel model: SSDPEKKW256G7 size: 238.47 GiB
   speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD serial: <filter> rev: PSF121C
   temp: 20.9 C scheme: GPT

Partition:

 ID-1: / size: 23.74 GiB used: 19.94 GiB (84.0%) fs: ext4
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p5
 ID-2: /boot/efi size: 96 MiB used: 31.1 MiB (32.3%) fs: vfat
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1
 ID-3: /home size: 182.12 GiB used: 71.61 GiB (39.3%) fs: ext4
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p3

Swap:

 ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 7.81 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
   dev: /dev/nvme0n1p7

Sensors:

 System Temperatures: cpu: 39.0 C pch: 35.5 C mobo: N/A
 Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A

Repos:

 Packages: 3010 apt: 3001 flatpak: 9
 No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mono-official-stable.list
   1: deb https://download.mono-project.com/repo/ubuntu stable-bionic main
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
   1: deb http://packages.linuxmint.com vera main upstream import backport
   2: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy main restricted universe multiverse
   3: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-updates main restricted universe multiverse
   4: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-backports main restricted universe multiverse
   5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ jammy-security main restricted universe multiverse
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/skype-stable.list
   1: deb [arch=amd64] https://repo.skype.com/deb stable main
 Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/sublime-text.list
   1: deb https://download.sublimetext.com/ apt/stable/

Info:

 Processes: 288 Uptime: 58m wakeups: 1 Init: systemd v: 249 runlevel: 5
 Compilers: gcc: 11.4.0 alt: 11/12 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.16
 running-in: mate-terminal inxi: 3.3.13

```

The firefox version available for download from Mozilla's website is the same I have atm (120.0.1). I'll give it a try anyway and report back

more options

You should check out neofetch. Gives prettier output.  ;-)) see screenshot

Modified by jonzn4SUSE

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It sounds like it might be stuck in drag mode. Try running in native Wayland by setting the environment variable MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=1.

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zeroknight said

It sounds like it might be stuck in drag mode. Try running in native Wayland by setting the environment variable MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=1.

I tried but it doesn't seem to help.


Installing firefox from the downloaded .tar from Mozilla's website also doesn't fix the issue.

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Visit about:support in the address bar and check that the "Window Protocol" reported is "wayland".

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Ah-ha... it still says x11.

I have the environment variable through the about:config interface. Does this look correct?


EDIT: from what I can read online it seems Mint 21.1 doesn't support Wayland. BUT do correct me if I'm wrong!

Modified by nico.venuti

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Does setting the environment variable MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1 make any difference?

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One question, if the environment variables I add show up in about:config but not in the dedicated section in about:support, does it mean I'm doing something wrong?

Anyway, freezes happen pretty much the same way even with this last change.

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This isn't about about:config, in Linux you export an environment variable to create it.

#!/bin/sh
export MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1
cd <path-to-firefox>
./firefox
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Thanks for that! I thought that Firefox managed its own.

So, even setting the two environment variables in the correct way, I do not notice any difference.


In case it's relevant, I've also gained new insight on the most reliable way of causing the freeze: selecting a tab, immediately dragging it left or right for a fraction of a second, and immediately letting it go. (think a quick-moving drag that traverses 1/8th of a tab banner's width before letting go). I can quite easily end up giving input just like this with a touchpad on accident.


Another thing: launching firefox from terminal I always get these warnings ``` ATTENTION: default value of option mesa_glthread overridden by environment. ATTENTION: default value of option mesa_glthread overridden by environment. [Parent 23692, Main Thread] WARNING: Failed to call GetIdletime(): GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.ServiceUnknown: The name org.gnome.Mutter.IdleMonitor was not provided by any .service files

'glib warning', file /builds/worker/checkouts/gecko/toolkit/xre/nsSigHandlers.cpp:187
    • (firefox:23692): WARNING **: 21:23:49.659: Failed to call GetIdletime(): GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.ServiceUnknown: The name org.gnome.Mutter.IdleMonitor was not provided by any .service files

```

I've been trying to find some info by looking at the system logs, .xsession-errors, dbus-monitor, but nothing additional is outputted when the freezes happen. And I can't understand whether the warnings are related to my freezes or not.

Modified by nico.venuti

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Chosen Solution

Try changing nglayout.enable_drag_images to false in about:config.

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This seems to be doing the trick! Re-enabling it makes the issue re-appear. Maybe it makes sense, given that when you drag a tab a little ghost image appears just like when you are dragging pictures...

It has only been a few hours, I don't want to get ahead of myself. I'll see how it goes in the next few days. Potentially I'll have some praise to bestow...

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zeroknight said

Try changing nglayout.enable_drag_images to false in about:config.

So, I think it's clear that this has fixed the freezing problem. I don't know why unfortunately. But thanks a lot @zeroknight and everyone else who chipped in.

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zeroknight said

Try changing nglayout.enable_drag_images to false in about:config.

This worked for me too, thank you!