HiMark,
Sorry you are having problems. I do not understand exactly what is happening to cause this, but the following are general suggestions and have a good chance of sorting out the problem:

Try to do the upgrade when no other programs are running, and also make sure Ffefox itself has stopped running, including any plugincontainer.exe, if necessary look for and kill the processes, e.g. with Windows Task Manager.

• see software update failed

If that fails to resolve the problem try to get rid of the current upgrade and try again. see for instance the old KB article:

• Updates reported when running newest version_delete-update-configuration-files

A a last resort download and install a new copy of firefox 10.0.2. Note there is normally no need to uninstall the current version first. Also note do NOT use any Windows or Firefox option to remove personal settings, or you are likely to destroy passwords, bookmarks and other settings.

• installing firefox on windows

I am not sure what you mean when you say

• Mozilla optimized for AOL.
• are you obtaining a copy of Firefox from someone other than Mozilla ?
  • If so what version and where from ?

I have been having the same problem for two to three weeks now, with both Firefox and Thunderbird. I don't have the "Mozilla optimized for AOL", but I am also running Windows 7, 64-bit, on a Dell.

I can actually use Firefox and Thunderbird when I first "upgrade" (as long as I don't close it). After about 30 minutes, if I close either and try to open them again, I get a message telling me that a pending install requires a restart. After I restart, both Firefox and Thunderbird are back to version 9.0.1. When I restart, I can upgrade to 10.0.2, but the process repeats itself and reverts back to 9.0.1.

I've checked my McAfee logs, and they don't have anything listed as being blocked other than tracking cookies, so I'm assuming that's not the problem.

I've tried all three steps listed above. I have the executable of both Firefox and Thunderbird on my desktop because I've had to reinstall so often. Neither firefox.exe nor plugin_container.exe are running when I try to install. I have no update folder or either of the xml files in my program folder. I've also tried uninstalling and reinstalling (without getting rid of preferences), but that doesn't work, either. I have not yet completely uninstalled and reinstalled (getting rid of my preferences, etc.) because I'd rather not have to do this unless I have to.

I wouldn't mind it so much except I use Lightning with Thunderbird, and the newest plugin (needed for version 10 of TB) doesn't work with version 9. Any assistance would be appreciated.

I fixed my one. It turns out that for some reason when installing my latest version of firefox it had disabled all my addons/plugins. Enabled them all one by one restarted my pc and all is working so far! Thanks for the help though.