Unable to auto-update firefox for few versions in a row (have to download installer every time)
I am not sure when exactly problem started but for few months I have problem with automatic update of firefox. It properly detects update and downloads it but when I click to restart browser and apply update (this should close browser and display update install bar) nothing happens - browser simply closes. When I launch it again and go into "about firefox" again I see spinning circle next to "installing update". Of course this update never installs. When I close it for 2nd time and go into "about firefox" it goes back to "update ready to install, click to restart" - and again, when I click it browser simply closes without restarting and installing update. I tried removing my profile, using safe mode, disabling antivirus. Issue seems to be related to firefox itself. I also tried removing mozilla maintenance service but it did not help. Does anyone have any idea what could be causing this? For now only way for me to update firefox is manually download full installer from website and then it installs latest version without any problems - until next month comes and I have to update it again.
Modified by Piterk
Chosen solution
I am using emsisoft. I think I managed to resolve issue by complete firefox removal with revo uninstaller, along with removing %localappdata%/mozilla folder. I only left AppData\Roaming\Mozilla folder to keep my bookmarks etc. Then I installed it again with small online Firefox Installer (341KB). It installed 124.0.1 version which recognized my old profile this time and it did not create new default one. Today when I tried to launch browser it automatically updated to 124.0.2! Mozilla maintenance service is also back so it looks like issue is fixed for now. I hope it will not return soon ;)
P.S. For now I will leave active checkbox near option "install updates when firefox is closed" because I worry that removing this checkbox might break something again.
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I just tried booting win 10 in safe mode and was able to successfully auto-update firefox. It looks like it was something in OS that was blocking update. I would be very grateful for possible location for install logs, maybe I will be able to determine which file/process during update was blocked during normal OS operation and which app could cause it. I do not have many apps in background, just cloud drive sync, gpu temperature monitor and anti-malware which I tried disabling. If not, I will have to wait until 19.03 for next update and I will spend hour or more disabling every service and app during boot step-by-step, until I determine which service or which app blocked update.
When a new major version is released then only a limited audience gets an automatic update during the first week, but updating via "Help -> About Firefox" should work in this case. Note that sometimes updates are halted to investigate for possible issues that are under investigation and a minor update is released to fix this. This is to avoid that too many people experience those issues. Firefox 123.0.1 got released last Tuesday.
See also:
Problem is not with detecting update availability. My firefox properly detects that there is update and tries to install it. Problem is with installation itself which does not occur. I even did not know that there was update but I noticed that my firefox did not launch after clicking icon on taskbar - this is symptom of update pending which tried to install but failed. I have to try to launch firefox again when that happens.
Unfortunately I was unable to determine cause for this behaviour. I tried disabling all possible non-microsoft services via msconfig but it did not work. I could also try disabling all autorun dlls via autoruns sysinternals tool, but I do not want to bother with re-enabling them again. For now I simply downloaded 342KB firefox installer and I will launch it ever month so it could download and manually install latest firefox.
Note that Firefox 124 has been released today, but you may consider to wait a week in case issues are reported that require a minor dot release.
What security software do you have?
It is possible that your security software is causing the problem. Try to disable security software temporarily to see if that makes a difference.
Chosen Solution
I am using emsisoft. I think I managed to resolve issue by complete firefox removal with revo uninstaller, along with removing %localappdata%/mozilla folder. I only left AppData\Roaming\Mozilla folder to keep my bookmarks etc. Then I installed it again with small online Firefox Installer (341KB). It installed 124.0.1 version which recognized my old profile this time and it did not create new default one. Today when I tried to launch browser it automatically updated to 124.0.2! Mozilla maintenance service is also back so it looks like issue is fixed for now. I hope it will not return soon ;)
P.S. For now I will leave active checkbox near option "install updates when firefox is closed" because I worry that removing this checkbox might break something again.