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FF and Thunderbird will not load properly

  • 3 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 5 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

ukwiz
ukwiz
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I have Thunderbird 17.0 and Firefox 17.0.1 on a Windows 7 machine.

I am unable to start either successfully. I have uninstalled and reinstalled both, and tried with no profile on both - to no avail.

On a machine boot, task manager shows one or two FF instances. Killing both of these and starting FF manually brings up the initial screen, but it then freezes.

TB is similar

I have Thunderbird 17.0 and Firefox 17.0.1 on a Windows 7 machine. I am unable to start either successfully. I have uninstalled and reinstalled both, and tried with no profile on both - to no avail. On a machine boot, task manager shows one or two FF instances. Killing both of these and starting FF manually brings up the initial screen, but it then freezes. TB is similar

All Replies (3)

user633449
user633449
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Please try a few different things:

Update Windows

Make sure you install every update for Windows (you may have to check a few times).

Update your Graphics Driver

Upgrade your graphics drivers to use hardware acceleration and WebGL

Fully Re-Uninstall Firefox

Certain Firefox problems can be solved by performing a Clean reinstall. This means you remove Firefox and any leftover program files and then reinstall Firefox. Please follow these steps one by one:

  1. Download the latest Desktop version of Firefox from http://www.mozilla.org and save the setup file to your computer.
  2. After the download finishes, close all Firefox windows (click Exit from the Firefox or File menu) and confirm all upcoming messages.
  3. Now, uninstall Firefox by following the steps mentioned in the Uninstall Firefox article.

IMPORTANT: On Windows, the uninstaller has the option to remove your personal data and settings. Make sure that you do not check this option; otherwise all of your bookmarks, passwords, extensions, user customizations and other Firefox user profile data will be removed from your computer.

After uninstalling Firefox on Windows, delete the "Mozilla Firefox" program folder, located by default in one of these locations:

  • (On 32-bit Windows) C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox
  • (On 64-bit Windows) C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox
  1. Go to the Windows Start menu and click on "Computer".
  2. In the Explorer window that opens, double click Local Disk (C:) to open the C:\ drive.
  3. Find the "Program Files (x86)" folder or "Program Files" folder.
    • On 32-bit Windows, double-click the Program Files folder to open it.
    • On 64-bit Windows, you will see a "Program Files (x86)" folder AND a "Program Files" folder. Open the Program Files (x86) folder.
  4. Look for a Mozilla Firefox folder. If you find one, right-click it and select Delete and confirm that you want to move the folder to the Recycle Bin.

Now, go ahead and reinstall Firefox:

  1. Double-click the downloaded installation file and go through the steps of the installation wizard.
  2. Once the wizard is finished, choose to directly open Firefox after clicking the Finish button.

Please report back to see if this helped you!

ukwiz
ukwiz Question owner
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The only thing out of those that I haven't done is updating the graphics driver

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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A possible cause is security software (firewall,anti-virus) that blocks or restricts Firefox or the plugin-container process without informing you, possibly after detecting changes (update) to the Firefox program.

Remove all rules for Firefox and the plugin-container from the permissions list in the firewall and let your firewall ask again for permission to get full unrestricted access to internet for Firefox and the plugin-container process and the updater process.

See: