Adobe Flash crashes, continually causes Firefox 13.0.1 to crash
Firefox continually crashes (approx. 6-8 times a day or more) due to Adobe Flash player crashing.
I'm running Firefox 13.0.1 and Adobe Flash 11.3.300.262
I noticed that since the second-to-last update of Flash Firefox has been crashing a lot. Before that Firefox crashed 'only' once a day or so.
Over the past few months I've read just about every thread related to Flash & Firefox and I'm not about to spend hours troubleshooting stuff, trying to disable hardware acceleration, etc, etc. I've done that before when the Flash-crash issue started a couple of months ago. (Also, Firefox is sometimes sending you automated crash reports, so you should have that data.) I would expect Firefox to simply "work" reasonably well, and as of the past couple of months or so, it hasn't.
W.T.F, Mozilla? I've used your browsers (Netscape) since the early 90s and have been quite happy - until recently, that is. As of now I'm having to go back to using Internet Explorer.
I sincerely hope Mozilla can finally resolve this issue as I still believe Firefox could be a great browser if it didn't "fight" with Flash all the time.
All Replies (20)
Unfortunately these crashes are more a result of a poorly tested Flash player plugin than Firefox issues.:(
The crash ID that you gave points to a bug, https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=763237 (please don't comment in bug reports) where the issue is being tracked and Adobe Developers are working on a fix. Hopefully, a fix will be released in a few days that corrects the rest of these crash issues.
"Unfortunately these crashes are more a result of a poorly tested Flash player plugin than Firefox issues.:( "
For months I've heard it being blamed on Adobe quite a lot. Whilst I suspect their software isn't "perfect", if it is "Adobe's fault" then why is my Internet Explorer *not* crashing?
Internet Explorer uses a totally separate version of Flash (ActiveX) than Firefox uses. Chrome also has a different version than Firefox. With each browser having their own version of Flash that adobe develops, there is plenty of room for bugs to appear in one and not the other.
I used flash player 10.3 for IE and above for firefox, it worked but the problems is that every time I turn off the automatic update but reactive flash me this one and I downloaded the recent version of Flash 11.3 .300.262, what to do?
Gewysig op
Ok, so I should go to the Adobe forums and ask them to fix their bug, or are Adobe developers simply not communicating with Mozilla developers and that course of action might not help?
If there's faulty communication between development teams then maybe Mozilla should buy out that department of Adobe (which makes the Flash for Firefox,) or perhaps Adobe should buy out Firefox(?) It certainly would do a lot to make Firefox reliable once more.
Based on the track record, as far as I can see, other than developers actually talking to each other and fixing things I think we're stuck with something that has become a dud. The easiest solution for me, and probably many others, right now is simply to switch browsers. In my case that's going back to IE.
I hope something happens since, other than this highly annoying bug, I have enjoyed Firefox.
I have the same problem. I did not have it with FF 12.x.
How to revert back to FF 12?
Your best bet is to downgrade to Flash 11.2 Downgrade Flash. Downgrading to Firefox 12 doesn't fix all Flash issues, so downgrading Flash is the best alternative right now.
You can first try if it helps if you disable protected mode in the Flash 11.3 player.
Thanks for your replies.
I reinstalled the latest Flash version 11.3.300.262 when prompted upon viewing a YouTube video and now, I can see the YouTube player again.
I still see a blank (white) Vimeo area (not previously mentioned) from that website. The video player tries to load, but then disappears.
I am still getting a js browser error on each of my open windows simultaneously many times per day (not previously mentioned).
btw - I disabled the Real Player plugin files (3) and there was no change with Vimeo - it still didn't work, so I re-enabled it again.
Hopefully, these issues will be resolved soon as I am now starting to use Chrome more frequently when that was not the plan. Chrome seems to be decent, though.
Thanks.
I was having this exact same problem. My flash would crash every time I closed a Flash instance. I didn't try to roll back my Flash version, as some have suggested, or fiddle with the hardware settings. Instead, I merely upgraded to the Firefox beta version 14.0 today (July 6, 2012). The bug seems to be happening less often, but it's still there.
Gewysig op
This is known problem with Flash 11.3. The solution is to downgrade Flash to 10.3. See - Adobe Flash plugin has crashed - Prevent it from happening again
As an update to this ongoing issue: Adobe Released an extremely critical security Fix for Flash 11.3. http://forums.adobe.com/message/4621126#4621126. The security exploit that this fixes is being actively exploited in the wild. This fix was not released for older versions of Flash (such as 10.3 or 11.2) but those versions may be vulnerable to this security issue.
So, our current recommendation is as follows: Update to Flash 11.3.300.271 (latest version ATM for Windows). If you have Realplayer, also update that. Test and see if you are still getting crashes or freezes. If you are not, it is likely that your issue was already fixed by Adobe.
If you continue to experience crashes, follow the directions at http://forums.adobe.com/thread/1018071?tstart=0 to disable protected mode. This will still leave you at greater security than using an older version of Flash.
We apologize for the inconvenience of this issue, and promise to update you all as information becomes available.
Gewysig op
let me explain my issues and then explain how i fixed it....i definitely agree with the guy who said flash hasnt tested properly.....i dont think its a bug...its a flaw....my computer is about 5+ years old.....ive had issues with flash in the past but nothing like this....since june or so flash has been crashing, i can no longer watch anything bigger than a quarter of my screen size...and even then it will crash after awhile. the worst part is about once a day its been locking up my processors and freezing my computer entirely causing me to manual reboot. even just opening gmail will crash everything sometimes. i tried chrome for awhile and although the performance was a little better upon boot-up i have the exact same issues....so its not something isolated to firefox. if adobe had actually properly tested, i (or anybody else) wouldnt be here. not everybody finds it necessary to purchase new computers and components like its a fashion statement, adobe should be more considerate
to fix my recent flash issues, i gogle searched 'adobe flash archive' and went here http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html to download an older version of flash. i jumped clear back to 11.2 and im running smooth like it used to and it feels good. if you download an older version go to control panel and uninstall ur current adobe flash. firefox automatically ran version 11.2 but i tried chrome and it was still running 11.3 (it must be built-in or something) so i had to disable 11.3 manually in chrome and keep 11.2 enabled in the settings
whatev,
Downgrading to Flash 11.2 is not the best solution since it has serious security vulnerabilities. The best solution (other than using another browser such as Google Chrome) would probably be to update Flash to the latest version and then, if you still have problems, disable Flash protected mode ... but you will need to remember to re-enable it in the future, when/if Adobe finally fixes the problem. Next best, IMHO, would be to downgrade to Flash 10.3, since it is more secure than Flash 11.2, For more information, see:
Gewysig op
thats seems to work by adding 'protected mode=0'....i'll post back if any long videos fail cuz i dont have time right now to wait and see.....been playing for ten+ minutes on a video and its running nice in the background
it honestly seemed like my cpu or gpu couldnt handle what was being thrown at it...or it was like a memory issue cuz any flash videos seem to get worse the longer they played unless i refreshed the page.....so idk if theres a memory leak or whats going on....good luck
im running 32-bit vista, s.p.2, only 2 GB ram, AMD Athlon 64 Dual-Core Processor tk-55 1.8ghz
Gewysig op
Thanks for posting back, whatev.
Just remember to re-enable Flash Protected Mode if Adobe releases an update that fixes the problem (maybe in Flash 11.4 ... which should be out soon). Protected Mode does add another layer of security to Flash. See the posts from Chris Campbell on this page: http://forums.adobe.com/message/4588765#4588765
Gewysig op
I just wanted to second this solution. I had been having no end of issues with Flash crashing. Since setting this value, I have yet to see it crash.
For what it is worth, this is in Firefox 14.0.1, running the latest version of Flash. Windows 7 x64 is the OS with 8GB of RAM.
update: downloaded flash 11.4 and removed the protectedmode=0 line from the mms.cfg file. its running without crashing but whenever i go full screen mode the video is still glitchy.....i never used to have this problem before the summer so idk if its all the security patches you guys add and my hardware not being able to keep up...
whatev, For issues using full-screen mode, turn off hardware acceleration in your Flash Player display settings:
- Right-click on any Flash video or animation (or on the Flash logo on this Adobe help page).
- Click "Settings" and uncheck “Enable hardware acceleration" in the Display tab.
This isn't the best workaround since the setting may not hold, for example, if you clear all cookies in Firefox or with an extension such as BetterPrivacy. Updating your display driver would be the best solution,
More info:
Gewysig op
thanks alice...i swear i dl and installed 11.4 yesterday but when i checked the plugins it was saying i had 11.3. so i apologize for that. dl and installed 11.4 today and its reflected in the plugins. video is running like it used to even with hardware acceleration checked.
when flash isnt working navigating the web can get a tad frustrating since flash inundates the whole web...so it feels good now thats its fixed. thanks again