Firefox 3.5 crashes vista 64 windows explorer!!!!

[DanRaisch]

Strange. Same set up here but absolutely no problems running Firefox 3.5.2.

[Marek_13th]

Since I got rid of Firefox 3.5, widows explorer is working fine. Not even one crash since July 11 2009.

[Win7Fan]

I am going to concur with the OP (Marek), Zentech and Steve.

I am having the exact same problem. Bought a new HP Notebook PC two weeks ago, with Windows Vista 64-Bit.

Previously used Windows FF with XP and 32-Bit Vista for the past 5 years with no problems.When I installed FF 3.5.1 on the new computer, I started having Windows Explorer crashes, exactly as Zentech described.

It mostly happens when I right-click when an OS window is open. Windows Explorer crashes and restarts. Once in a while it will crash even when not right-clicking but just opening a folder inside a window.

I tried updating FF to the latest version, 3.5.3 but no dice. It kept crashing, so I uninstalled FF altogether. And now its back to normal, no more Windows Explorer crashes. Previously it was happening 4-5 times a day.

If anyone has a solution to this problem, I'm sure the rest of us would greatly appreciated it. For now I am resorting to IE (yikes). I prefer to use FF if at all possible, because of the stellar extensions and problems with IE vulnerabilities. But having my Windows crash repeatedly is not worth the trade off.

I will wait until Win 7 ships, and hopefully 64-bit Win7 can handle FF, which 64-bit Vista seemingly cannot do. It's strange because other posters here have mentioned they have the same set-up but no crashes, so not all 64-bit Vista machines are having compatibility issues.

The only other programs I'm using are Avira AntiVir, Ad-Aware 08, Spyware Blaster and Malwarebytes Anti-Malware. Not sure if some combo of these programs along with 64-bit Vista and FF is causing a conflict. I will also try to install FF 3.0 and hopefully that will work. If someone else can post a solution in the mean-time I'd appreciate it.

[Aberian]

I've been experiencing this same issue on Vista 64 since July. I originally suspected it was faulty ram or a shell extension issue, but after much testing and messing around with ShellExView that doesn't seem to be the case. This problem started shortly after installing Firefox 3.5. I was hesitant to place blame on Firefox as the culprit because it seemed unlikely, but several forum threads lead me here. My errors in Event Viewer are identical to the original poster in this thread, with the same faulting module, and one of the same exception codes.

The explorer.exe crashes appear to be completely random, I can't recreate it on demand despite my best efforts. The crashes usually occur days apart from each other, although I usually notice them if I'm on the computer long enough. I don't believe it's caused by any specific web pages. Usually it happens after right clicking (outside of Firefox), although one time it occurred while clicking and dragging a file. Once explorer.exe has crashed and restarts I can then make it crash repeatedly by right clicking inside a folder, on a file, or even my desktop. I then restart my PC and never experience it again for many hours/days.

As far as this happening when Firefox isn't running I can't say for certain, I just started suspecting Firefox the other day and it has only occurred once since then, and Firefox was running. Firefox does rarely crash, or continue running in my task manager forcing me to end the firefox.exe process to open a new browser session. But that has only happened maybe twice in the past few months that I can recall.

While reading through forum threads about this issue, I've been trying to narrow it down to some software conflict with Firefox. The only common software that I've seen shared by several users alongside Firefox were Kaspersky and Avira AV, reported on Vista 64-bit and Windows 7 64-bit . Personally I'm using Avast, so that rules me out. I have Avast, Trillian IM, and my Logitch setpoint mouse driver running in the background currently. I'm also on a less than 4 month install of Vista 64.

I'm rather dependent on Firefox and its extensions, and don't want to revert to a less secure albeit stable version or change browsers. I hope someone with more technical knowledge than me can help to diagnose this problem and offer a solution. I'll reply to this thread if I find one myself, but that's unlikely.

[teoli2003]

Firefox.exe not shutting down is often cause by the Skype extension. If you have it, try disabling it.

[Alice]

(For the record) Related bug report, marked "INVALID":
Bug 518412 - Firefox causes Windows Explorer to crash under Windows 7 RTM Ultimate x64

[Aberian]

Thanks for the link Alice!

The finger pointing blame game in those comments don't look promising to finding a solution to this bug. This problem goes away when Firefox is uninstalled, so technical jumbo aside this should be addressed by the Firefox team in my opinion.

It's reassuring to know I'm not alone, and the 3500+ views of this old thread indicate that a lot of others are experiencing this as well.

[teoli2003]

Aberian, a crash in the OS or Windows Explorer should primarily fixed by MS, as told in the bug. But if you can give steps to reproduce to the devs, they can analyzed them and forward the technical details to MS. They can even perhaps implement a work-around.

They have already reported such elements to OS-builders.

The point is to give steps to reproduce the problem so that the devs can reproduce it reliably on their computer (and not on yours). And that's not easy.

[Jim too]

"It's reassuring to know I'm not alone, and the 3500+ views of this old thread indicate that a lot of others are experiencing this as well."

Don't assume that the only people that read this thread have this problem!

[Alice]

See if this thread is helpful:
https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/forum/1/481957
Firefox crashes explorer.exe in Windows 7

[Volter]

I registered to mention that i'm having this same issue on a dell studio 1555 with vista home ultimate, sp1. I've been plagued by explorer crashing when i right click, but only after i've used firefox after that reboot. This is 3.5.4 at the moment, i'm going to uninstall it and verify that my problems go away. For what it's worth, i'd refrained from using firefox for 12 days, and had 12 crash free days. once i used firefox again, immediately after closing it, i could not right click without explorer crashing it. Rebooting did solve the issue, but my reliability score will reflect the problem. I just wanted to mention that i've been fighting with this issue for weeks and i just now stumbled across this old thread, and it amazes me that this issue is this old.