Please consider turning on send info to Mozilla before posting a question. This helps us help you.

No idea..... But with a chance all it did was create a new profile and your old one is still there also. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-firefox-stores-user-data and has how to switch profiles if found it there : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-and-remove-firefox-profiles

Please let us know if this solved your issue or if need further assistance.

Hi 72Herbie, sorry to hear about this problem. Before restoring any backups or taking any drastic measures, could you check the following:

If you haven't already, you may want to do a normal system shutdown and startup to release any file locks and complete any pending updates.

If your data does not magically reappear, the most likely scenarios for complete data loss are:

(1) A Refresh started but the migration of data from your old profile to your new profile was incomplete, or
(2) Your old profile was locked, so Firefox ignored it and created a new one.

Here's how to investigate those two possibilities:

Did Firefox perform a Refresh?

Unless it was interrupted in progress, you should find a folder on your desktop named Old Firefox Data. Inside would be a semi-randomly-named folder with freshly updated files. Do you see anything like that?

If so, we'll suggest how to rescue key files or completely restore the earlier profile folder.

If not...

Does the Profile Manager list your immediately previous profile folder?

To check on that, inside Firefox, type or paste about:profiles in the address bar and press Enter/Return to load it.

This page should list all the profiles Firefox is currently aware of. If you see a profile that is not currently set as default that looks promising, scroll down to it and click the Set as default profile button below that profile, then scroll back up and click the Restart normally button. (There are some other buttons, but I think those are still "under construction" so please ignore them.)

Firefox should exit and then start up using the other profile. Is that the right one?

If it's not there...

Did Firefox orphan your old profile folder?

Here's how to check whether there are additional profile folders in the standard location in addition to the one you're using. Start by opening your current Firefox profile folder using either:

* "3-bar" menu button > "?" button > Troubleshooting Information
* (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
* type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Enter/Return

In the first table on the page, click the "Open Folder" button, to launch a new window listing various files and folders in Windows Explorer.

In the Windows Explorer address bar, click the capitalized word Profiles to move up one level in the folder hierarchy. More than one folder here by any chance? Do the files in those folders look like they were last updated around the time of the update?

If you've got any promising looking folders, we can discuss next steps to recover use of them.

Pkshadow said

Please consider turning on send info to Mozilla before posting a question. This helps us help you. No idea..... But with a chance all it did was create a new profile and your old one is still there also. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-firefox-stores-user-data and has how to switch profiles if found it there : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-and-remove-firefox-profiles Please let us know if this solved your issue or if need further assistance.

Thanks so much for your help. These links weren't helpful in this case. It appears there are no other profiles listed in Firefox currently.

jscher2000 said

Hi 72Herbie, sorry to hear about this problem. Before restoring any backups or taking any drastic measures, could you check the following: If you haven't already, you may want to do a normal system shutdown and startup to release any file locks and complete any pending updates. If your data does not magically reappear, the most likely scenarios for complete data loss are:

(1) A Refresh started but the migration of data from your old profile to your new profile was incomplete, or
(2) Your old profile was locked, so Firefox ignored it and created a new one.

Here's how to investigate those two possibilities:

Did Firefox perform a Refresh?

Unless it was interrupted in progress, you should find a folder on your desktop named Old Firefox Data. Inside would be a semi-randomly-named folder with freshly updated files. Do you see anything like that?

If so, we'll suggest how to rescue key files or completely restore the earlier profile folder.

If not...

Does the Profile Manager list your immediately previous profile folder?

To check on that, inside Firefox, type or paste about:profiles in the address bar and press Enter/Return to load it.

This page should list all the profiles Firefox is currently aware of. If you see a profile that is not currently set as default that looks promising, scroll down to it and click the Set as default profile button below that profile, then scroll back up and click the Restart normally button. (There are some other buttons, but I think those are still "under construction" so please ignore them.)

Firefox should exit and then start up using the other profile. Is that the right one?

If it's not there...

Did Firefox orphan your old profile folder?

Here's how to check whether there are additional profile folders in the standard location in addition to the one you're using. Start by opening your current Firefox profile folder using either:

* "3-bar" menu button > "?" button > Troubleshooting Information
* (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
* type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Enter/Return

In the first table on the page, click the "Open Folder" button, to launch a new window listing various files and folders in Windows Explorer.

In the Windows Explorer address bar, click the capitalized word Profiles to move up one level in the folder hierarchy. More than one folder here by any chance? Do the files in those folders look like they were last updated around the time of the update?

If you've got any promising looking folders, we can discuss next steps to recover use of them.

Sorry, hit Send before ready.  :-( Thanks to you and Pkshadow for all your help and ideas. Sadly, these latest suggestions don't seem to be working as well.

I'm wondering if a workaround might be for me to establish a Firefox sync. I have not done that, having used Xmarks for bookmarks, etc., but of course xmarks doesn't backup extensions and all the uniquely Mozilla information. Firefox on my other machines seems to be okay yet. Would setting up a sync account on one of them, and then syncing to my problematic machine, work?

Many thanks for your advice.

No just copy the profile and insert into the screwed up one. Or at the least Bookmarks --> SHow all Bookmarks --> Import & Export Bookmarks and export as HTML in your other then import it. save that HTML file and remember to do regular exports and will have bookmarks for years. Mine are from Win95

72Herbie said

I'm wondering if a workaround might be for me to establish a Firefox sync. I have not done that, having used Xmarks for bookmarks, etc., but of course xmarks doesn't backup extensions and all the uniquely Mozilla information. Firefox on my other machines seems to be okay yet. Would setting up a sync account on one of them, and then syncing to my problematic machine, work?

I don't fully understand how Firefox merges together information from different Firefoxes, and I think you would risk corrupting your good setup. Perhaps if you first create a fresh profile on the problem machine and make sure it's okay and then Sync.

Profile Manager - Create, remove or switch Firefox profiles (I suggest not removing, only creating!)

Thanks to both of you jscher2000 and Pkshadow. By importing the good profile into the problematic machine, everything worked well. At the same time, the problem version updated to Quantum. So I am a happy camper again, not to mention having a much faster Firefox with the update.