How do I fix FF needing links clicked twice in order to load?
Using vers 22.0, Win7 x64. I had no issues up until yesterday, where I had a power failure. Upon reboot, everything in FF was loading slow as balls. SpeedTest ran okay, showing no difference in UL/DL rates, but I have to click everything twice in order to get it to load, sometimes more. Clicking it once just results in a white page, nothing appearing for up to a minute. It doesn't even time out, no error message. If I click it again or F5, it instantly loads the page.
I found numerous links describing the same problem through Google, but none of them were actually resolved before being closed. Safe mode does jack. Disabling my extensions does equally nothing. I -think- something got corrupted by the sudden power failure, but that's just pure conjecture. There's nothing being blocked by the firewall, and everything loads fine in Chrome/IE, but I'd really rather not have to resort to those. Again, everything worked fine prior to power loss.
Idk. Full reinstall? Is there any way to make FF run a file verification check? I dumped all the temp files via CCleaner, but it made no difference.
Chosen solution
No difference
edit: flushed everything again, Installed 19.0 without profile, seemed to work okay, then overwrote it with 22.0, imported bookmarks, and it's all good. Idk why it worked this time, when the steps I took were identical to what I did yesterday (and to what cor-el posted), except using 19.0 full as the base install instead of 23 hub. Running at full capacity again, no further issues.
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One thing to know about Firefox crash recovery is that Firefox will not use any cached files after a crash, so everything needs to be loaded again from scratch on all websites. This is slower, but you still shouldn't need to click every page twice...
Considering that you run AdBlock Plus and NoScript, you probably are not loading tons of extraneous garbage...
The instant success of F5 does make it sound as though Firefox is somehow timing out or giving up before painting the page. I can't think of a relevant setting to check for that.
It is possible that, coincidentally, the last restart completed some pending installs, whether of Windows updates or other software.
If you notice the problem more on interactive pages, you might review your Flash posture. This is some standard guidance that addresses the most common issues with that plugin. I'm sure you've seen some of it before, but just in case:
(1) Make sure all recorders/downloaders that interact with Flash media are as up-to-date as possible, or disable them.
(2) Disable hardware graphics acceleration in Firefox and in Flash
(A) In Firefox, un-check the box here and restart:
orange Firefox button (or Tools menu) > Options > Advanced > General > "Use hardware acceleration when available"
(B) In Flash, see this support article from Adobe: http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/video-playback-issues.html#main_Solve_video_playback_issues
(3) Disable protected mode (Windows Vista/7/8)
See this support article from Adobe under the heading "Last Resort": Adobe Forums: How do I troubleshoot Flash Player's protected mode for Firefox?
Went through all that, didn't make a difference. Thanks anyways.
I backed up my profile & completely uninstalled 22.0, deleting everything in %appdata%, progfiles, relevant registry entries etc. Then I installed 23.0 & imported my profile. It's still happening, not really sure what else to do at this point, besides ditching everything (profile included) & downgrading. Hesitant to try a system restore, since that generally screws with more than I'd like (eg, CS4's registration always gets broken afterwards, requires full reinstall). Problem isn't replicating with other machines on my network, just this one.
Re: updates, I have automatic updates (windows & FF) turned off & manually apply the security patches as req'd - nothing was applied on reboot. Steam applied an update to itself when it started up, but that was it.
I have dumps of all the HTTP requests being made if that helps, but I'm not savvy enough to troubleshoot them.
Modified by tt888
Do a clean reinstall and delete the Firefox program folder before (re)installing a fresh copy of the current Firefox release.
Download a fresh Firefox copy and save the file to the desktop.
- Firefox 23.0: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/all.html
Uninstall your current Firefox version, if possible, to cleanup the Windows registry and settings in security software.
- Do NOT remove personal data when you uninstall your current Firefox version, because all profile folders will be removed and you lose personal data like bookmarks and passwords from profiles of other Firefox versions.
Remove the Firefox program folder before installing that newly downloaded copy of the Firefox installer.
- (32 bit Windows) "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\"
- (64 bit Windows) "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\"
- It is important to delete the Firefox program folder to remove all the files and make sure that there are no problems with files that were leftover after uninstalling.
- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Uninstalling_Firefox
Your bookmarks and other personal data are stored in the Firefox profile folder and won't be affected by an uninstall and (re)install, but make sure that "remove personal data" is NOT selected when you uninstall Firefox.
If you keep having problems then also create a new profile.
I already tried that, as noted in my previous reply. Shotgun approach copy/paste "support" really isn't helpful, thanks.
Since then, I've deleted everything, keeping a backup of my profile on a usb stick. Round 2 reinstall w/o importing the old profile, vanilla 23.0: no proxy settings, no add-ons, nothing but the base install - still getting nothing on the first few clicks. It's like the first couple of requests per host just get null'd, and I have to resend them for it to properly connect/load webpages.
Running out of things to test.
Try to boot the computer in Windows Safe Mode with network support (press F8 on the boot screen) as a test to see if that helps.
Chosen Solution
No difference
edit: flushed everything again, Installed 19.0 without profile, seemed to work okay, then overwrote it with 22.0, imported bookmarks, and it's all good. Idk why it worked this time, when the steps I took were identical to what I did yesterday (and to what cor-el posted), except using 19.0 full as the base install instead of 23 hub. Running at full capacity again, no further issues.
Modified by tt888