Issue with Firefox v1.0.3 upgrade - blank screens

Hmm... this is a bit circular. Don and I both had problems with our Firefox extensions when we upgraded to 1.0.3 - every page we browsed to was blank. I figured out the solution, Don blogged it, so I'm just going to quote him:

I recently upgraded my Firefox install to v1.0.3, only to encounter sporadic blank pages when launching.  One of my coworkers also experienced the same issue and identified a fix.

If you recently upgraded only to find Firefox sometimes displays a blank page at launch, perform the following steps to fix.

  1. After a successful launch, select Bookmarks/Manage Bookmarks from the menu.  A reboot of your computer, or even a reinstall of Firefox v1.0.3 is required to get a successful launch.
  2. In the Manage Bookmarks application select File/Export from the menu to export your bookmarks to a HTML file.
  3. Close Firefox.
  4. Using Windows Explorer browse to "C:\Documents and Settings\[YOUR_USERNAME]\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox" and delete the "Profile" folder. (may want to just rename the folder so you can find old settings)   NOTE: This will delete all of your profiles and installed extensions/themes.
  5. Relaunch Firefox.  This will create a new default profile.
  6. Open up the Bookmark Manager and select File/Import from the menu.  Select "Import from File" when asked and browse to the file saved in Step 2 above.
  7. Reinstall all extensions and themes.

While I am a huge fan of Firefox, it is reasons like this blank screen issue that Open Source is destined to fail when a commercially supported option is available.  We will see if I am still a "huge fan" when IE 7 comes out later this year.

The Firefox extension model is one of my favorite features, but extensions seem to be the most frequent cause of upgrade problems. I went a step further than Don - I renamed the profile folder, then browsed through the user.js file in my old profile after a successful install and copied some of the settings (like the Session Saver history) into the new profile.

Source: Don Good

 

10 Comments

  • I've found that turning off the web developer toolbar, closing the browser. Open then close it once more. Next time you open it the tabs should appear fine, you can then turn on the web developer toolbar.



    That fixed it for me, but I have no idea what the underlying issue is so it could be different for everyone else.



    Kev

  • I had this problem too. Uninstalling and installing did not help. The problem was caused by Kasperspy antivirus. Disabling kaspersky for only once did made firefox start. Seemed that is did some kind of I/O that was blocked by kaspersky. Probably for an internet update check.

  • Had a similar problem. Deleting the profile was not necessary, but deleting the extensions did the trick. To do so, browse to your profile folder and delete all the GUID-named items.

  • Hello,

    I downloaded v 2.0.0.11 and now when I open the browsera blank page displays. The only open buttong is the home icon.

    Then when I check for updates, the following error displays:
    AUS: Update XML File Malformed (200)

    Can you please help me? Internet Explorer works and lets me view web pages.

  • I'm also getting the same problem of blank pages and blank URL, uninstalling and reinstalling does not help. Neither does deleting my profile or all the other things I have tried including shutting down Zonealarm. The really weird thing is that it works from hotkeys if I am careful to close all instances of Firefox before. It sounded like 2 different installations of Firefox (not so) but that would have been too easy. It doesn't even work in safe mode. I'm totally stumped!!!!!
    Any ideas?

    P.S. I hate using IE!

  • 1.Uninstall Firefox by the add/remove in the control panel.
    2. REBOOT.
    3. Do a search for files or folders named "Firefox"
    4. Delete all the folders that turned up in the search of step 3.
    5. REBOOT again.
    6. Search to confirm you removed all of the existing Firefox folders.
    7. Install latest Firefox.
    8. Reboot.

    Miss any of the folders labeled Firefox and you're wasting your time.

  • I teach online classes and can get to my login screen just fine. When I enter my username and password, the status bar indicates the page is loading but ends with "Done" and a blank screen. When I try to log in as another user, I have no problem.

    Ideas?

  • Same problem. It just all blank when I open it... :(

  • hi..agree wt Ramon Smits ,i paused Kasperspy antivirus den open firefox...walah,d browser was fine..then enabled Kasperspy antivirus..n so far everything is smooth...

    thanx Ramon Smits ;)
    saved me much time

  • Modify Headers does not add anything spcfieic to the request headers that will allow you to identify it. However, most users will likely use a user-agent string that is shorter than the real thing.EG, for the Samsung T809, a Firefox user would likely have: SAMSUNG-SGH-T809. However, the full UA string from a device is: SAMSUNG-SGH-T809/1.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 UP.Browser/6.2.3.3.c.1.101 (GUI) MMP/2.0,T809UVEJ9I hope that makes sense.

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