Firefox 37.x @ shutdownhang Crash with Older Graphics Card
Since upgrading to Firefox 37.0.0 on my 32-bit Vista machine, the Mozilla Crash Reporter frequently pops up about 1 min after I close my browser and the crash report signature usually starts with [@ shutdownhang | WaitForSingleObjectEx | WaitForSingleObject | PR_Wait | nsThread::ProcessNextEvent(bool, bool*) | ...]. I've monitored firefox.exe with Process Explorer and there doesn't seem to be any lag between the time I close my browser and when the firefox.exe process stops, but my hard drive seems to thrash for about one minute after the browser is closed until Mozilla Crash Reporter pops up.
The App Notes section of each crash report seems to point to my older NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS graphics card [note that the latest available v. 9.18.13.783 (v. 307.83) driver is installed]. Disabling graphics acceleration (Tools | Options | Advanced | General |Browser) does not stop the shutdown hangs.
I've also noticed the Modules tab of the crash reports highlight IPSEng32.dll and IPSLdr32.dll which are associated with the browser Intrusion Protection feature of my Norton Internet Security software. I only tested for a few hours but didn't see a single shutdown hang when I disabled my Norton Toolbar extension for FF37 (v. 2014.7.12.7).
Here are my last 8 crash reports with FF 37.0.1 and the Norton Toolbar enabled:
bp-8b4926b5-8bc2-4365-a225-c03a82150406 (06-Apr-2015 10:05 AM bp-09f183d5-d3bf-4ed6-9a4d-7cc922150405 (05-Apr-2015 6:41 PM) bp-d78732e0-5912-488f-b104-43dae2150405 * bp-745d7515-8826-471d-9f5c-2be072150405 bp-5d845c69-1314-41da-aff3-c2ee82150405 bp-bc8aeadf-76b8-406b-be99-bc8832150405 bp-96f7e48c-5de2-4803-9a3a-2e2152150404 bp-5f6a437c-4b2e-448c-ad88-2066e2150404 (04-Apr-2015 1:01 PM)
- different crash ID (RtlQueryRegistryValues | RtlQueryRegistryValues | WinSqmStartSession)
I do not have the Adobe Flash plugin installed in FF. It could be a coincidence but when I click the "More Reports" link for recent @ shutdownhang crashes over 99.9% of systems did not have Flash installed. For the one RtlQueryRegistryValues crash, 100% of systems had 32-bit Vista and 100% did not have Flash installed.
The release notes for FF 37.0.1 state that this patch fixes a "start-up crash due to graphics hardware and third party software" so I'm guessing that the combination of my old graphics card and the Norton Toolbar (or even the blank Flash plugin version in my Windows registry) are causing a similar shutdown hang on my system.
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 37.0.1 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11 HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS
Modified by cor-el
All Replies (5)
Can you try starting up a Fresh Profile and seeing if Firefox crashes there? This isn't caused by your graphics card nor the fact that you don't have flash, it's possible the norton toolbar is causing this (I'd suggest you remove it anyways, it's a piece of junk).
Hi Tyler:
I've created a new profile and will post back after I've run some tests, but the Norton Toolbar extension was automatically added so I'm not sure if my tests will be conclusive. I can enable/disable the Norton Toolbar in my new profile but the only way I can permanently remove this toolbar is to uninstall Norton Internet Security from my Control Panel.
Modified by lmacri
Hi Tyler:
I just had another [@ RtlQueryRegistryValues | RtlQueryRegistryValues | WinSqmStartSession ] crash with the new Firefox profile when I closed Firefox. I was crash-free until I added the Video DownloadHelper v. 5.1.2 extension from the Firefox Add-ons site . This update was released 31-Mar-2015 but there are no details for this release in the version history.
bp-d45c850d-c1bd-42f9-8c4a-733de2150406 (06-Apr-15 2:28 PM)
I'll keep testing just in case this is an intermittent browser crash and the installation of Video DownloadHelper was just a coincidence.
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 37.0.1 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11 HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS
Hi Tyler:
I have now tested a new Firefox profile and performed a clean reinstall of FF 37.0.1 as instructed in the support article Firefox keeps crashing at startup. I can still see my hard drive thrashing for about a minute each time I close Firefox but the crashes are less frequent now. This morning's crash had an ID of [@ zzz_AsmCodeRange_End | RtlAddAccessAllowedAce | PR_Lock | MessageLoop::DoWork() ]
bp-4534247a-bb10-4072-a72b-58a1a2150408 (08-Apr-2015 8:31 AM)
Like the [@ RtlQueryRegistryValues | RtlQueryRegistryValues | WinSqmStartSession ] crash mentioned above, "More Reports" show that 100% of recent crashes occurred on 32-bit Vista systems.
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 37.0.1 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11 HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS
Other N360/NIS v21.x users are now reporting the same problem with FF v37.0.1 crashing on exit when the Norton Toolbar v2014.7.12.7 is enabled and Norton is investigating. See phat monkey's thread Norton 360 Toolbar is Crashing Firefox on Exit in the Norton forum.
After further testing it appears that my crash with the Video DownloadHelper v5.1.2 add-on enabled was just a coincidence.
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 37.0.1 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11 HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS