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Update to Firefox 46.0.1 causes screen flashes and lines ... fix?

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For my Mac Pro with NVIDIA G120 video card, OSX 10.9.5, Firefox v. 44.0.2 worked OK. After a Firefox upgrade, I then I began to have what I thought was video card issues. After much work to trouble-shoot the video card hardware, I found the problem to be with Firefox.

Starting around Firefox v 45.x.x and then definitely with the current v. 46.0.1, when moving between pages and also back through web page history, there is a lot of image flashing, video noise, and artifacts like lines and ghost images appearing momentarily until the window is refreshed. Note: Safari does not show this problem. Turning off hardware acceleration from the Firefox prefs menu (and restarting FF) has no improvement. The few common plug-ins I have are all up-to-date.

In a test, reverting back to Firefox v. 44.0.2 will eliminate this video flashing and noise problem. I have tried updating to latest NVIDIA software, but this does not correct the problem. There is something in v. 46.0.1 of Firefox that is causing this video annoyance ... how do I revert back to functionality of v. 44.0.2 of Firefox but not lose the security updates? Thanks for your support.

For my Mac Pro with NVIDIA G120 video card, OSX 10.9.5, Firefox v. 44.0.2 worked OK. After a Firefox upgrade, I then I began to have what I thought was video card issues. After much work to trouble-shoot the video card hardware, I found the problem to be with Firefox. Starting around Firefox v 45.x.x and then definitely with the current v. 46.0.1, when moving between pages and also back through web page history, there is a lot of image flashing, video noise, and artifacts like lines and ghost images appearing momentarily until the window is refreshed. Note: Safari does not show this problem. Turning off hardware acceleration from the Firefox prefs menu (and restarting FF) has no improvement. The few common plug-ins I have are all up-to-date. In a test, reverting back to Firefox v. 44.0.2 will eliminate this video flashing and noise problem. I have tried updating to latest NVIDIA software, but this does not correct the problem. There is something in v. 46.0.1 of Firefox that is causing this video annoyance ... how do I revert back to functionality of v. 44.0.2 of Firefox but not lose the security updates? Thanks for your support.

All Replies (5)

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If you have problems with current Shockwave Flash plugin versions then check this:

  • see if there are updates for your graphics drivers

https://support.mozilla.org/kb/upgrade-graphics-drivers-use-hardware-acceleration

  • disable protected mode in the Flash plugin (Flash 11.3+ on Windows Vista and later)

https://forums.adobe.com/message/4468493#TemporaryWorkaround

  • disable hardware acceleration in the Flash plugin

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/891337 See also:

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Thanks for the ideas, but no improvement, Firefox still flashes and displays odd image artifacts when page updates.

  • I have already updated to latest graphics driver.
  • I am running Mac OSX 10.9.5, so Vista protect mode does not apply
  • Disabling hardware acceleration makes no difference
  • Disabling Shockwave Flash plugin seems to make problem worse

Again, something in v. 46.0.1 of Mac version of Firefox, compared to v. 44.0.2 is different or broken to cause this. Should I simply go back to v. 44.0.2 of Firefox?

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I've called the big guys to help you. Good luck.

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Can you post your Troubleshooting information?

You did close Firefox via "Firefox > Quit Firefox" after disabling hardware acceleration?

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Yes, as stated in my original post, I not only restarted Firefox, but also did same for computer.