No matter what I seem to do, reinstalling, or a completely clean install, I just can't get Firefox 3.0.6 to work properly on my XP machine ... I'm just fed up with all the repair jobs, memory leaks, freezes, etc, so I am going back to the last build of FF2.

I just wondered if anyone else here is in the same boat, and if by going back to FF2 will it really be the end of the world for me as opposed to using FF3 ?

So...what exactly are you after? Going back to a browser that is past it's due date? Might I suggest trying one of the firefox 3.1 betas or nightlies? If you perhaps tell us what your problems are then maybe someone could help you figure out what's wrong?

There's no way I'd go back to FF2. I haven't had any issues with FF3 or FF3.1 Beta 2. I also have around 12 add-ons in use. The main reason why I wouldn't go back to FF2 is because I just love the "Awesome bar" too much.

Not had any more problems with FF3 than with any other browser. Although it's not the end of the road to use FF2 if it were me I'd first try the portable version and see if that helped before giving up.

Your problems may be a consequence of a corrupt profile. You might wanna check on that before you give up for good.

No memory leaks or freezes here. Must be user error...

Well, my FF3 intermittently hangs on a start, soars up to using 150mb in the task manager before I even touch it .. after I close it at that stage, the next time it opens up at around 50mb (ff2 was always usable on a first start, no memory leaks for me, always dependable). If I leave the pc for any amount of time and come back to it, start FF3 again, I'm back to a 150mb start and have to go through the same process again.

I've tried everything, going through the extensions one by one after a clean install, not importing bookmarks, etc and I have tried the betas, which were just as bad for me, but I just can't seem to get it to run properly no matter what I try.

I guess I will try one of the portable versions, but I'm expecting the same and will probably revert to FF2.

Why don't you try this. Uninstall firefox rename your profile directory and cleanup any traces of firefox directories, reinstall and try again. If this does not fix your issues there might be something wrong with your computer. Using firefox3 here with no issues with a lot of extensions installed.

Install firefox 3.1

I will give that one last try, thanks.

Seems there are no FF2 users now on neowin ?

ff3 is uses less resources and is way faster than ff2 on any machine I've used. Do as suggested and delete your profile and all that, what you are experiencing is definitely not normal, firefox 3 should use less memory than 2.

Is there a way to have FF2 & FF3 on the same pc ?

That right, they changed the way caching was dealt with in FF3 dues to the number of complaints about FF2's memory use.

Just put them in different folders. You just can't load them in same time, and... You will have trouble with bookmarks and extensions... In short, it may be worst...

If you happen to have many Live Bookmarks, Firefox might hang at times. This can also be caused by extensions.

Alternatively, try unchecking "Tell me if the site I'm visiting is a suspected attack site" and "Tell me if the site I'm visiting is a suspected forgery", under Security in the Options window (at best on a clean profile).

Hi noroom & thanks - I've just deleted all my live bookmarks (don't need them in FF anyway) and it seems to be a lot more stable, no hangs so far although I will give it a day of heavy use to see how it goes.

I think this will be a lot better with Firefox 3.1.

hopefully so .. and btw you were spot on - it was the live bookmarks that was causing FF3 to eat up the memory ...
deleting them cured it and all is well now.thanks.

I couldn't even afford to go back to 3.0.x as there are so many fixes and improvements in 3.1/3.5 that are so very nice.

i nv have any problem with FF3