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Firefox crashes

  • 14 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by FredMcD

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Firefox started crashing randomly since around Christmas even in safe mode. The only software changes around that period that I can think of are: - automatic windows updates - switching from AVG internet security to a trial of Bitdefender Antivirus 2018. - switching to Zone alarm firewall

Thunderbird has become a little more unstable since that time as well.

My Notebook specs are: Dell Aspiron, Intel i7-7700HQ CPU @ 2.80Ghz, 16 Gb, Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, Windows 10 Home,

Can you help? Thanks David

Firefox started crashing randomly since around Christmas even in safe mode. The only software changes around that period that I can think of are: - automatic windows updates - switching from AVG internet security to a trial of Bitdefender Antivirus 2018. - switching to Zone alarm firewall Thunderbird has become a little more unstable since that time as well. My Notebook specs are: Dell Aspiron, Intel i7-7700HQ CPU @ 2.80Ghz, 16 Gb, Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, Windows 10 Home, Can you help? Thanks David

All Replies (14)

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Hi David, sorry to hear about the crashes.

If you are getting the Mozilla Crash Reporter form, your Firefox may have logged some data that would help track down the cause of the problem. You can submit that data to Mozilla and share it with forum volunteers to see whether it points to the solution. Please check the support article "Firefox crashes - asking for support" for steps to get those crash report IDs from the about:crashes page, and then post some of the recent ones here.

If you are getting a crash dialog from Windows, then any data would be in Windows' Event Logs. I'm not sure exactly where to look for those.

If you are not getting a crash dialog but Firefox is freezing up, see: Firefox hangs or is not responding - How to fix.

Also and/or meanwhile, if you an trigger a crash in a reasonable amount of time, could you test in Firefox's Safe Mode? That temporarily deactivates extensions, hardware acceleration, and some other advanced features of Firefox that might make it more prone to crashing on some systems.

If Firefox is not running: Hold down the Shift key when starting Firefox.

If Firefox is running: You can restart Firefox in Safe Mode using either:

  • "3-bar" menu button > "?" button > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
  • Help menu > Restart with Add-ons Disabled

and OK the restart.

Both scenarios: A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh).

Any less crashy?

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Hi jscher2000 Thanks for your quick reply, sorry I forgot to add the most important information the crash details

Here the Crash ID: bp-8a56aaeb-1654-4d2e-99b3-91ac71180120

Does this shed any extra light on what is going on? running Firefox in Safe Mode still crashes randomly... Thanks for your help David

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bp-8a56aaeb-1654-4d2e-99b3-91ac71180120 Signature: `anonymous namespace'::checkHandshake

The report flagged; dosafo.dll but I can't find any information about it.

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Hi David, thank you for the report. That crash signature seems pretty rare, with four other reports in the past week (and none on file from earlier). It could be an incompatibility with some other software that just updated recently.

Do you have other report IDs that might provide additional context for the problem?

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Sure! here are two rash reports that would have been since the problem started to occur...

13th Jan Crash ID: bp-cf61f8f4-0378-413c-9062-820581180112

12th Jan Crash ID: bp-502c84c9-7856-4637-b820-9e5281180112

No other crash reports between the above dates and 22 November when everything seemed ok...

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Very consistent. Can you find the file dosafo.dll on your system and figure out what it is associated with?

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The below image is all I can find... the ddl is associated with an unknown application... how could I found additional information about the extension?

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On the Details tab, there may be details about the publisher, possibly other info.

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Not much info there... googled the extension... no results. just running Spyhunter to see if that pick it up... might take a while though

Thanks for your patience ;)

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Hmm, that Details panel is suspiciously blank. Unless it's a stealth file created by Bitdefender, I'd be inclined to rename it with a .txt extension to see whether that helps.

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Just noticed two similarly named files in the System 32 folder, they are a lot larger... see image

Can I do irreversible damage renaming the file extension to .txt?

Spy hunter did not pick up the files... will try some other virus scanners as well just to be sure...

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I have no idea what those files are. You can try this upload-to-test site:

https://www.virustotal.com/

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Thanks, I am just uploading the files now. I will run a few more virus scans and will also uninstall Bit Defender tomorrow which has given me a lot of false positives and interfered with some software. Back to AVG... better the devil you know...

Thanks for your help to date... very much appreciated! Cheers David

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davidmreinbold said

Can I do irreversible damage renaming the file extension to .txt?

The only thing that should happen is the program that calls it reports an error. Rename all the dosafo files by adding .txt to the end of each.