One of the biggest “improvements” that Mozilla claims has made its way into Firefox 3 is improved memory usage, in particular, the vanquishing of memory leaks:
Memory usage: Several new technologies work together to reduce the amount of memory used by Firefox 3 over a web browsing session. Memory cycles are broken and collected by an automated cycle collector, a new memory allocator reduces fragmentation, hundreds of leaks have been fixed, and caching strategies have been tuned.
We’re sorry to have to break it to you, but if you thought it was too good to be true you were right. Firefox still uses a lot of memory – way too much memory for a web browser.
We haven’t seen it reach 1GiB+ like we have with previous versions, but it’s quite normal for Firefox 3 to be sucking up ~300MiB of memory right off the bat, without a memory leak (the difference between memory leaks and normal memory abusage is that in a memory leak you’ll see the memory usage keep increasing the longer the browser is open/in-use).
This is a screenshot of Firefox’s memory usage after just a half hour or so with only a couple of HTML-only tabs open. This particular screenshot was taken on Linux where Firefox is using the shared GTK libraries – on our Windows PCs, it’s normal to find Firefox 3 taking up ~350MiB or so on both XP and Vista.
The sad thing is that isn’t caused by one of the memory leaks that plagued previous versions of Firefox. It’s Firefox 3 is supposed to take up that much memory – at least, that’s our assumption given how we’ve never seen it take up less.
Firefox 3 has a number of memory-hogging features added to the mix that are probably at least partially responsible for the absolutely gargantuan memory footprint. For example, Firefox now uses an SQL engine to keep track of your history and bookmarks, amongst other things. While that particular feature is powered by SQL-lite, which should – in theory – not take up too much memory, we’re at a loss to explain what else is wasting memory left, right, and center in the world’s most-popular open source web browser.
Things like full-text on-the-fly searching of the web cache for when you type text in the address bar certainly have an impact as well – that’s a lot of stuff to keep in memory at one time. But Opera 9.5 does the same with a lot less memory, so obviously Firefox 3 is doing something wrong.
It’s a shame that Firefox 3 is on the verge of a release and is so terribly unfit to run on any machine – Windows, Linux, or OS X – with less than at least a couple of gigabytes of memory.
FF3 runs perfectly on my system with 512MB ram with over 20 extensions installed. There are some sites that may cause a "memory leak" but I've rarely come across any. With 10-15 tabs open, my FF3 memory usage is 150-160MB at most and I haven't had a crash or anything unusual happen for week.
Perhaps you should also read http://blog.pavlov.net/2008/03/11/firefox-3-memory-usage/
I don't know how the benchmark in that link was conducted because no matter what I do I can't replicate their IE7 memory usages - for me it's always < 60MB.
FF3 reaches the ~300MiB mark without any extensions or anything.
Then I'd have to say there's something severely wrong with your system. I haven't even come close to 300MB on my other system with 1GB Ram with the same profile that my 512MB system is using unless it was a site that caused a memory leak. It starts off at 80-85MB and hovers at around 120-130 after it's been open for a while.
This is on 4 different machines, ranging from 2GB to 8GB of memory, and 3 different platforms (Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Linux).
I can't use Firefox 3 on a 3rd machine (an Asus Eee 900) because of its memory usage - freezes way too often; so I'm using Opera 9.5 instead.
The same Firefox 3 session that was posted above, a couple of hours later:
I also can't imagine how that's happening to you on Windows (for more apples-to-apples feedback, maybe stick with that platform) with no extensions in a half hour and not even browsing many pages. Are you sure this is a stock install? Makes no sense whatsoever. I really think the subject of the post should be in the form of a question and not a statement.
Also not making sense is how you're saying that Opera is so much better. I'm here to tell you that with a normal number of tabs (let's say 10-15, as opposed to the number you may be using), certainly by the end of a day's use, if not before, it will have busted through 200MB and once in a while 300MB on a 2GB RAM system. I've never not seen it do this. I'm speaking of the latest 9.5 beta, incidentally, not 9.2. Unlike FF, Opera very much doesn't like giving RAM no longer in use back, either, so it's pretty much up, up, up.
I'm using the RC1 version and with 3 tabs open it's using 84MB. I haven't noticed any strain on the system with it. It's been open for 5 hours.
Wow. Not sure what kind of tests you ran, but I have never seen that kind of memory leak with FF. Did you tweak something? I would surmise that you have either an abnormal installation/configuration with the browser, or some 3rd party tool/utility/malware, etc. that is screwing things up.
Hell, I can have a dozen or so tabs at once and have yet to see my system stressed like that....AND I run about 12 addons at the same time.
Just now, on crappy IBM work PC with only 512Mb of RAM, I have 12 tabs open and FF is at 92,764K memory usage...hardly stressful.
Of my FF3's, on ubuntu runs at 24MB and has been for the last 2 hours, my Win XP is at 100MB.
Doesn't seem to be troubling mine much.
Bit of a none story, me thinks.
Running FF3 beta 5 on Kubuntu, with FF running nearly 24/7, I average 145Mb memory usage. Seems obvious that your claim of it never bein under ~300Mb is patently wrong.
I'm running FF3B5 on WinXP Pro. I have two windows and a total of five tabs open, all of which are extremely content rich. I'm still only at 116MiB of memory usage out of my installed 2GiB.
Your results are extremely atypical and should not be considered indicative of a larger trend.
Nice job spreading FUD about one of the best browsers available.
RC2 is out: ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/3.0rc2/win32/
@Steve: I think that's a good idea about a 3rd-party influencer. It sure would be interesting to know what that is.
@Rick: Yeah, I really would like to see a HijackThis log of what he is running when FF3 jumps to 300Mb. Should be an interesting read :)
Your claims are a bit excessive. I'm been using FF3 for around an hour now and it's only using 218Mb of RAM
ONLY 218Mb of RAM! I can't for the life of me think of another desktop application that needs so much memory
There is no FUD involved - and no spyware, the screenshot above was taken on Linux, guys!
Anyway, some screenshots from a quick test done on a brand, spanking new installation of Windows XP on a Virtual Machine w/ 2GB of memory.
Test involved opening 25 tabs in IE7 and Firefox and leaving them in the background for 3 hours or so.
Turns out IE7 does automated cleanup when it's minimized.
Task manager when they're both minimized 3 hours later: Firefox is 213MB, IE7 is 1.3MB (not a typo).
Task manager after maximizing both windows (3 hours later): Firefox is 212MB, IE7 is 27MB.
Bizarre. I will have to do some more checking to try to replicate your issue. However, can you try running your tests without devenv running? That can't have anything to do with it, but you never know. I wouldn't be surprised that an MS product (in this case Visual Studio) would interfere with a non-MS browser :)
Let's just say devenv isn't running on the Linux machine at least ;)
It's not possible for Visual Studio 2008 to interfere with Firefox's memory usage:
Unless, of course, Firefox is purposely searching for people running Visual Studio .NET and opening a memory leak just to piss off Windows developers, but I think we can safely rule out that option :)
Update: I now have ten content-rich tabs open in two windows. My Firefox instance has been running for just over three hours. I'm up to 132MiB of RAM usage, for comparison, my Outlook is currently using 77MiB of RAM.
Links to places that have found results quite dissimilar to the OP, but strangely similar to all of us that have been disagreeing in the comments: http://www.builderau.com.au/blogs/syslog/viewblogpost.htm?p=339270943 http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080317-firefox-3-goes-on-a-diet-eats-less-memory-than-ie-and-opera.html http://ejohn.org/blog/firefox-3-memory-use/
and of course, the Slashdot discussion of one of the above links: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/18/0531241
Hi Mahmoud,
it should not be too difficult for you to post a batch file that would allow anybody to reproduce your results... Or at least the list of sites open for your test. It could be something like this:
firefox -url http://www.google.com -url http://www.ebay.com
This would allow developpers, and others to check what's going on.
Thanks in advance.
Reproducing the results should be pretty easy if we are given the list of URLs to load... firefox -url http://www.google.com -url http://www.ebay.com ...
Without this list, no-one can check those results. So will you please provide it? Thanks.
I just started Firefox 3.0 RC1 with 6 tabs and it's running at 178 megs of RAM and 168 megs in page. Usually after a few hours it swells up to 250+ megs of ram.
My test:
Middle-click the BBC News RSS feed so that all those URIs are loaded into Firefox tabs. Added to it http://neosmart.net/ , http://neosmart.net/blog/ , and http://neosmart.net/forums/
Mahmoud, your second example involved 25 tabs for 3 hours and 213MB, which sounds more realistic (and less than what Opera would be). Your first example involved a couple tabs for a half hour and 300MB. That's not really consistent even with yourself. What are you saying, that if you left the first example for another couple hours it would drop precipitously?
Are you on RC2 now?
Windows is now on RC2, Ubuntu is still on RC1.
I don't recall exactly how long Ubuntu's Firefox was running for, but it wasn't too long. I definitely opened a lot of tabs, but never more than 7 or 8 at once (open one, close one...)
Firefox simply isn't disposing of the memory it used. For instance, right now FF is using 308MB of memory (Ubuntu) and it's been on for a couple of hours at least, but only 4 tabs are currently open and, again, never more than 8 or so tabs ever open at once. No plugins. No rich media. Only AJAX is Gmail.
After similar browsing on Opera 9.5 weekly, memory usage was 101MB.
Hmmm...interesting issue. Truly. I wonder if it has to do with the specific pages you had opened? If you, say, open this http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/firefox-3-is-still-a-memory-hog/ page 12 times, does it do it as well?
I'm asking because not everyone is seeing this, but you are, and the only way we can trace it is to do the same test.
Well, with 40 tabs opened to BBC news pages and other pages, I only manage to get to 240MB in memory usage. This is on Windows XP, and Firefox has been running continuously for almost 5 hours. I see none of the memory resource issues that FF2 suffers from. most days FF2 crashes. It's one saving grace is that it always reloads what was being viewed. A great feature. FF3 looks like a big improvement overall.
I'm talking about 9.5 weekly as well. I've never seen it hold to 100MB with any kind of normal use. I typically use 10-15 pages and it's always above 200MB, usually reaching 300MB by the end of the day, and Opera doesn't give back more than a token amount if you're lucky.
Earlier, I understood your Ubuntu/300MB test involved very few tabs, but now you mention that you cycled through many different sites and had upwards of 7 or 8 open at once. That's a different impression.
What happens when you run it, leave it on the home page, and do nothing else with it? Let's start there as a baseline and then get into specific sites.
I do have vs2008 and xp sp3. I get around 200MB on ff3 after using it for couple hours. But initially ff3 starts around 80MB.
I am running Firefox 3 just fine on a 5 year old XP box with 1 gigabyte of RAM. It definitely appears to be something of a memory-intensive app but not nearly as bad as the previous version.
take a coredump of the process, and open a bug in bugzilla on the mozilla page, and stop spreading FUD.. it's possible that there is some system condition, homepage combination that you open, etc. A core file is the OS's raw view of the process and can show the chunks of native memory and which libraries are holding them. Follow an evidence-based, open source approach and stop whining.
Firefox is a pile of shit browser and the code is full of security holes and bugs.
As a developer, I'd note that there are many different definitions of "memory usage"; they're not all directly comparable. On Linux, you can see a bunch of them if you do "cat /proc//status" where is the process ID. (Look at the things that start with "Vm*".) On Windows, there are actually a whole bunch of different ones as well, and the one that Task Manager makes most prominent on XP and earlier actually isn't all that meaningful.
Probably what we need is a tool that can blame Mozilla memory use on the different Web pages that are open (or, in the case of leaks, were open) or on the browser UI itself.
Er, make that "/proc/PID/status" where PID is the process ID. (Using angle brackets clearly wasn't a good idea.)
I got to work at 9:30 or so this morning. Firefox 3 beta 5 has been running all day (it's just past 5 o'clock), enduring heavy use, with no fewer than five and as many as perhaps thirty tabs open simultaneously. I've got several extensions installed, including Firebug and Greasemonkey. Memory usage is now at 188 megs.
You're a big liar, I'm running Firefox 3 on Windows XP with 55 tabs & two Windows, it only takes ~170 Mb of RAM. Stop making fake screenshots, or stop testing an alpha version.
You're a big liar. I'm running Firefox 3 on Windows XP with 55 tabs, and it's only taking ~170 Mb of RAM. Stop making fake screenshots, or stop using an alpha version.
Dude,
Firefox is RC2, not alpha. And he's not lying because on this computer with 4 gigabytes of ram Firefox is using 320MB for only 12 tabs.
The 12 tabs are kind of heavy on the media though.
Though such comments should be taken with a YMMV tag, it's nice to see some people taking the issue seriously. In either Ff2 or Flock 114 (on a 1GiB system running XPSP3), visible memory usage does seem to be much higher than one would expect. Never really try to troubleshoot this but it does make Mozilla browsers much harder to use. Currently, with four media-light tabs open, Flock.exe is using over 400MiB of RAM. And it keeps growing as I type this (without opening anything else and without having anything happening in the background). To a number of people, Ff3's appeal has a lot to do with usability. If we expect performance to be much higher in terms of memory and get mixed results, chances are that widespread Ff adoption might suffer (despite the download day). So, it'd be really nice if we could identify the issue, even though some users have never had it. Is there any chance that the issue might have to do with a setting having to do with caching, session restoring, or opening page? Just a thought.
The same happens to me. In fact, the memory usage didn't reach the 200MB with FF2 so it was a shock to me when I found out. For me it happens when I'm downloading something big (300MB+), I think that the leak is in the built in download manager.. anyways, I'm hoping for Mozilla to solve all that before the final release.
Not reproducible here. Getting firefox 3 to eat more than 150 mb is not possible for me no matter how many hours have I been using the same session and no matter if i have 15 tabs with images, flash, etc, on them. Of course this is the nightly 32-bit version - the native 64 version included in ubuntu eats more memory. Right now I have this page opened and another at meneame.net, and it's only eating 66 MB..
ZDNet benchmarked all the browser and found that firefox 3 is the browser that eat less memory when having many tabs opened, better than opera, including betas. It's also the most fast, along with safari, in javascript benchmarks: http://www.zdnet.com.au/reviews/software/internet/soa/Browser-faceoff-IE-vs-Firefox-vs-Opera-vs-Safari/0,139023437,339289417-1,00.htm%22%22
here, i have 25 tabs (with embedded flash and pdfs included) for 6 hours, and it's using 95.6MB.
http://kronin.bla.cl/ff3rc2-memory-usage.png
Count me in the "quite disappointed" group. At the moment I have FF3 opened for about a day, three total tabs (in only one instance) and task manager is showing 208,688MB for the firefox process. And I've seen it worse. For me it just uses more memory over time, much like FF2. It could be the sites that I regularly visit, but it never seems to clean up the memory. My only plugins are Adbock Plus, Adblock Filterset.G Updater, and Foxmarks.
It's too bad, this is literally the only thing I was looking forward to in FF3.
Actually... Is there a good method to monitor Ff's memory usage, on a tab-by-tab basis? It might be nice to find which pages are causing issues. With about 12 tabs, Flock 1.2 (based on Ff2) was using over 600MB, last night, at the end of a relatively long session. After a restart, it's taking up 355MB. Haven't used Ff3 yet but it does sound like some issues might be remaining. Of course, these issues are difficult to reproduce, especially if they occur late in a session. But for Mozilla-based browsers to spread even further, these issues need to be completely ironed out. Haven't had similar issues in IE7 or Safari3.
@Alexandre, other than through trial and error I don't think so. I wouldn't worry about FF2's failings, as that's essentially EOL as of sometime in the next week or so. You'll be hard-pressed to find similar leaks in FF3, though that's not to say just the right page can't do it. FWIW, here's a much, much better test of browser memory than the article we're commenting on: http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=2024
@Rick Thx for the Kingsley-Hughes piece. Looks good. As for Ff2 being EOLed, the reason it may remain relevant is that memory management is the main point of comparison. If at least some users are reporting a low increase in memory performance while updating from Ff2 to Ff3, it might mean that some of the memory problems occur in very specific contexts which haven't been taken into account during development of Ff3. IOW, it might have little to do with actual leaks and more to do with some specific pages or features that are only relevant to a subset of users. Given the fact that, for many of us, improvements in memory management is the main "selling point" for Ff3, solid evidence that Ff3 uses memory very efficiently in all situations would be very convincing. But I'll look at that ZDNet article more carefully. Maybe the problem, in my case, is 12" from the monitor.
Seems some others have similar problems: http://www.pcmech.com/article/firefox-3-hogs-memory-like-crazy/
550 MB of memory on FF3!?!
http://www.pcmech.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/2550486069-a5f7b7d29e.jpg
ok, Mahmoud... don't make us think you work for Big Bill, seeing that you favor IE7 over FF3 (and don't take me wrong, i'm using Vista and loving it), i wish i could send you a screenshot of FF3 on my laptop, 10+ tabs open and it NEVER gets above 75MB of memory usage, and i'm online more than 6 hours in a single day...
there's GOT to be something seriously wrong with your machines. sorry.
BTW, i use XP and SuSE on a triple boot configuration together with Vista, no problems with FF3 in any of the systems..
thank you.
Rafael, all of my posts were made from Firefox 3 on Ubuntu - this one too. I love Firefox, I just wish it were better :)
Ok, so I just checked mine, running Vista with . I have had this open since I got home at 10. It is now nearly 4. 6 hours. I have learned that there is no memory leak. But my system has 4 GB of ram. Firefox flucuates between 175,000 and 200,000 KB. I have 15 tabs open, 2 going to deviantArt (many pictures on each page), one going to a movie site, two going to email, and the rest to various websites that many people would visit. I do check my processes often, but I have never found the memory usage to be more than 200,000 KB. As I open up a 16th tab to watch a show that is about 21 minutes in length, and after letting it sit, it levels out at 185,000 KB, jumping up when I type to a a max of 204,000 KB. In the past, I have used firefox with over 30 tabs open at a time (When I counted it was 36. That was after I closed many of them) and checked the memory usage and have never found it to go much past 250,000.
Please note that this is not a detailed study and I have not been looking at the task manager for every time that I have opened firefox. This is just what I have seen and how it acts for me.
I will agree that firefox does have many areas of improvement and allowing users to be able to determine how much of their ram is used would be a good one, but I see two things about this.
One thing is, that the people who buy the 512 MB computers are usually the ones who do not go out and download firefox because they like it. They use IE because it is there. If one of those people does decide to use firefox, they tend to be patient and let their computer lag. The second is that a memory usage on a modern computer ranges from 1 GB to 8 GB. Looking at brand new Dell Laptops shows me that the least amount of memory you can buy in a laptop is 1 GB. To hit 150 MB with a single program is a decent hit, but all that it does for the user is make it so they have to close their browser before playing a game.
I agree that it would be nice if it was smaller, but the way I see it is that changing how much memory it uses, for power users, will not do much. If there were lite versions that could come along to go with small distros like puppy or people with older computers, that would probably be more efficient than to try to shave off little bits here and there. If there was a way to cut down on the memory usage without taking out too many things that are important or helpful I would say go for it, but I like what FF3 has to offer and will accept its power requirements.
FWIW, I do not believe the memory leak that I've observed would necessarily manifest itself very clearly in the span of 6 hours. For me, a common use case would be as follows:
Browser starts at some point during work day On and off browsing throughout the day Leave computer on (locked, but running) and go home Come in the next morning to a very slow running computer, with FF take hundreds of megs of RAM
It's much worse when this happens over the weekend. With FF2 it was not uncommon for me to see 800 megs of RAM being eaten by FF2 after a weekend. FF3 seems a little better from a "leak" perspective, but it still takes entirely too much RAM and I have still sometimes noticed a gradual increase over time, but not as consistently as with FF2. Here I type on my laptop (2 gigs of RAM total) with 4 tabs open and FF3 is using about 180 megs of RAM. Way too much IMO.
Just a few pointers:
XP, Linux, OSX and Vista's task managers all report RAM usage by processes in different ways, so apple to apple comparisons really aren't possible or meaningful.
Throw away half your physical RAM (or launch a lot of RAM-hungry apps together) and watch as the RAM usage of the processes magically decreases, as bigger parts of them have to be swapped to disk. Program using ram when it's available is not a bug. Empty RAM is no good.
If relaunching FF every 12 hours is too much of a problem, methinks somebody's protesting too much anyway.
Just for the record, FF3 is quite the stellar release. Kudos to the team.
For the true speed freaks or people on slow machines, this guy here has awesome optimized builds of the Mozilla apps - I happily use his FF build.
http://www1.plala.or.jp/tete009/en-US/software.html
"If relaunching FF every 12 hours is too much of a problem, methinks somebody's protesting too much anyway."
Wow. So, in your opinion this should be expected for a browser that's trying to capture IE's market share and is releasing a major version primarily focused on memory improvements? Yikes. If it's to be expected then perhaps they should document it.
By the way, my FF3 has been up for over a day and I'm at 289 megs.
@Aaron Good point. If restarting the browser every so often is expected, just document this point. In fact, it'd be very useful for Firefox to have clear documentation about user-side memory management. It'd be especially useful to pinpoint which pages/tabs take the most memory. Even better would be a warning of the "you may need to close this tab if you want to maintain performance." Even if it really is the user's fault, the fact that Ff may become sluggish under certain specific conditions can severely affect the user's perception of Ff. Not saying that another browser is better. But if you put yourselves in the shoes of a newbie, a sluggish browser can be a very frustrating experience. It might well be that this user should be careful about which sites should remain opened in different tabs at which point, whatever the browser. No matter. The more the user's Ff experience can be qualified as pleasant overall, the more likely this user is to get other people on Ff. In other words, we're talking about a campaign of seduction, not an engineering feat. User problems are problems too.
I'm running Firefox 3 RC2 with 12 tabs open and I've only got 134.21484 MB reading on 1024MB RAM. Yeah, I need more RAM. System is Dell Dimension 8200 Win XP ~1.864 GHz.
The memory is used for the Cache. Every modern Application use as much as possible, that's not always a bad sign. The memory get released if another application request it, there's not much to worry.
@Aaron Bad point. FF3 has much more then a better memory management. The speed & momory issues are just the most noticeable for end users. Thats why everyone talk about it.
@Mahmoud Al-Qudsi
I like to add ...if your Machines have 2GB to 8GB of memory - 300 MB is nothing! As more you have as more get taken. That's why memory usage is much lower on a 512MB System.
If you like a fast System why are you using the Gnome crap?! Because you are using Debian? Thats even more worse! Keep in mind the useless (too much simplified) Nautilus take already 60 MB. Compare this with the complex tasks of a Web Browser. Think about several 1000 Images/Files are loaded if u open lots of Tabs.
@Werner
Then I suppose you should break that news to Mozilla Europe president Tristan Nitot, who focuses on the memory enhancements whenever interviewed on the subject of Firefox 3.
I'm not defending the memory usage of other applications, simply pointing out where Firefox still has more work to do. My point is, so long as the Firefox development team is focusing on improvements to memory usage and management in version 3, it's probably a good idea to get it right this time instead of having to release v4 with "focuses on memory improvement," etc.
I didn't buy 4GB of RAM so developers could use that as an excuse to improperly GC, I bought it so I could run multiple VMs at once and play high-end 3D games.
I've been using Firefox since it's early days, but I become less and less comfortable with each update. I just tried Firefox 3 and it's horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible. I DON'T WANT a window that covers half the screen when I check typed URLs, I DO WANT it to work with my current add-ons. I don't want my "web experience enhancing" with bloatware, I JUST WANT TO BROWSE THE WEB FFS ! Mozilla are turning into Mcrosft.
@Kevin McAspurn
So don't update anymore! Keep Firefox 1.
@Kevin McAspurn:
"...that covers half the screen when I check typed URLs..."
Huh? What do you mean by that? Sorry, but not sure what the complaint is. It isn't FFs fault your addons don't work. Time to get the addon creator(s) to update their...well...addons...
He's referring to the new smart bar that takes up a lot of screen real-estate when it displays all URIs that have content matching the (partial) words you entered in the address bar.
@Mahmoud: ah...ok...wondered what he meant.
To fix that, go to http://www.pcmech.com/article/firefox-3-disable-the-smart-location-bar-sort-of/
In summary: use about:config and change browser.urlbar.matchOnlyTyped to true AND browser.urlbar.maxRichResults to 1 (then it will act like FF2x).
For the record, Ff3 does seem to have (as promised) much better memory management than Ff2. In fact, the notifying the user of possible slowdowns is quite a useful feature and may have a positive impact on basic usage patterns. It would still be very useful if users could monitor their memory usage more precisely, tab by tab. We all understand that opening too many tabs/pages at the same time may result in a drop in performance under certain circumstances. But some of us might need a better way to prevent such situations. Especially since so many pages are media-heavy, these days. And since open tabs can be a way to manage lists of "things to read and/or blog about." In terms of features... Because memory management was the main improvement to be touted, I didn't really expect some of the new features. Bulk bookmarking and tagging is a step toward Flock, it seems. Kind of neat. Some add-ons still need to be updated but several of them still work. Overall, Firefox seems more usable than before, which should be a good thing in terms of widespread adoption. The main app needs to have consistent performance. Bells and whistles can be provided by add-ons.
I am running the version released yesterday in Vista, with 10 tabs open (including this one :P). The RAM use is < 80MB and the working set is < 100MB.
Please try to understand that I don't want these "enhancements". I don't want my web browser to sing, dance, and make me a cup of tea. I do want an efficient, stable program that can be configured the way I like it, with as few bells and whistles as necessary. The "Smart Bar" contained all my bookmarks. Why ? I already have them !, and for a dumb machine to try to guess what I intend to type is frankly insulting. Neither am I enamoured by someone adding features that I don't want, and will never use, but which will get in my way every time I use the program. Maybe I'm still browsing the web in an old-fashioned way, (I've been online for a VERY long time now) but that's my business, and it's the way I like it. Either way, it took me just a few minutes to dislike FF3 intensely, it's been uninstalled, and it's not going back.
@Kevin...
So download the two Addons: Hide Unvisited and Old Location Bar....simple. Then it's done.
I think your arguments are specious and if you bothered to look up solutions for your issue, you would get this working the way you want.
You know you can disable the "awesome" bar or revert it back to how it used to work so that you can still benefit from the other features. If you've been using the internet for a long time you can figure it out. There are extensions to do it or about:config changes, don't give in so easily.
@Steve... No, I won't add more stuff to something that (IMHO) has already become bloatware, and it's not an argument, it's my personal opinion, to which I'm entitled. As for getting it working how I want, it won't accept the add-ons that I already have and like, so no chance there then. I don't accept that if it's Firefox, and it's new, then it must be good. FF3 doesn't do it for me. Time to move on.
You're right, you are most certainly entitled to your own opinion. However, keep in mind that using a plugin to disable a feature is, technically, no different than using a plugin to add a missing feature.
"However, keep in mind that using a plugin to disable a feature is, technically, no different than using a plugin to add a missing feature."
Not necessarily true. Depends if that disabled feature is still using system resources in the background, in which case there's arguably a very big difference.
I've got similar issues. FF3 takes up around 250MB of RAM and CPU usage hovering around 85%. When I try to close it, the window closes but its still running in the background. I never had any issues like this with FF2
Did someone read comparisons with other Browsers? I think its a fact the memory management got a huge improvement compared with old FF2. Its not more worse but even better then any other decent Browser. I have a old PC switch tabs took sometimes ~10 seconds with FF2, this is past now. Whenever i feel something get slow its always Javascript related. Everyone use Google Analytics, Javascript Frameworks (sometimes several with plugins), the Web has changed a lot. Dont forget the extensions. I love Firebug but it can make some pages really slow. Replace the old Spidermonkey Javascript engine with something better should be the next logical step. It seems this get addressed for upcoming major releases.
About the Awesome Bar. I did hate it too. But i learned to use it the right way (several keywords) and the Awesome Bar get more smart as more you're using it. Using SQLite should make Firefox faster too. I know from my own experience SQLite is really fast and it takes much less resources then parsing XML Files.
My FF3 memory experience had been much worse than FF2. For me, FF2 would top out around 200MB but FF3 keeps going. Just this morning, I rebooted my machine. Within 1.5 hours, FF3 was consuming 1.2GB of memory! I have a ton of extensions but wasn't that one of the advantages of FF to begin with?
Well I made a search because it seemed to me that ff3 was spending too much memory in comparison to other programs( ff3 is taking 99.992 K). No other program is using that much, even Dreamweaver or Photoshop CS3.
I thought this was just my problem, but I see it is a ff3 problem.
FF3 just restarted after crashed while trying to load Yahoo mail 3 windows, 2 tabs each 280MB.. typical. In another hour of heavy surfing this will get up to over 300MB and I'll be forced to restart... again. While I loathe IE.. it usually maxes out at 100K with the same heavy surfing...
cheers!
Heh, I returned from a 5-day Independence day weekend to see my FF3 browser taking 1.1 gigabytes of RAM. I use netvibes a lot, and I think (though I'm not sure) that it has been open each time I see these ridiculous RAM usages. So it could be due to netvibes, but I do not believe a website should be capable of slowly increasing RAM usage to the point where it's using over a gig. I still blame this one on netvibes.
Right, I'm also having problems with FF3, memory usage isn't really an issue for me as I have 2GB availiable and with around 12 pages open I get between 150Mb & 220Mb of usage (dependant on the content of the sites). Whats troubling me more than anything is the way my laptop fan momentarily kicks in on FULL when I open firefox (around 5 seconds), then drops down to a constant half speed with 1 page open - and increasing for the duration of the session as I open more pages.... until it's at "jet engine" status... and the laptop feels like I could fry eggs on it (very handy for keeping your hands warm in the winter no doubt). CPU usage hovers around 25% when firefox is idle and jumps between 16% and 50% in use (AMD turion TL-60 2GB). I have tried a complete uninstall with EVERYTHING gone..reg keys etc etc and reinstall, but to no avail, also, I have no extensions installed and I'm running the latest release of FF3. If I use IE7 with 12, 15, 25 pages I get slightly lower memory usage than I do in FF and my laptop fan doesn't even break wind, totally silent, nada, nish, nowt, zip, zero! I cant stand that constant whirring sound. It's driving me doolally, especially as I love FF, uber fast and usable, but the noise just stops me from using it. Any ideas?
Opera 9.51. 4 windows open with a total of 45 (fourty five) tabs. 17 hours uptime. 89'356 Kb How can people say that 250-300 Mb from the very start with only 4 tabs is normal?!
I have IE on my PC for three reasons: 1. I like choice 2. It seems to play some internet radio/streaming sites that FF balks at 3. (pertinent to this discussion): For when I want to go for a quick drive and leave the gas guzzling uber-SUV at home....
But reading through these posts is also telling me that there are a lot of people who do not share my FF experience of a 200MB+ memory hit. So whay is it so sensitive to environment/sites/whatever?...that's a failing in my book and I'll keep reading, looking for some insight.
Also...for all those people who seem to tie plastic, metal and bytes to their sense of self...please turn off your PC sometime and spend a lazy evening reading Gulliver's Travels.
radiocam from the antipodes
It is a bit pathetic people stating "after an hour the memory usage is still xxx". Firefox 2 had problems after some 5 hours of heavy use and/or a couple of days it had been idle.
Aaron had a point above: after SEVERAL DAYS you really ARE in trouble. I am using FF in an Ajax development environment where it is DEFINITELY NOT a good thing to close the browser too often. However, due to the ongoing memory problems (and others) I still have to close FF at least once or twice a day. Total memory usage goes very quickly (in less than 4 hours) way too high and after that I experience the same problems (though milder) I had with FF2: high CPU usage and jerkiness.
Whatever the reason is the behaviour is far from acceptable. That said the situation is a lot better now. With FF2 one of our team members recorded a FF2 memory use of 2.4 GB after returning from his long weekend.
FF3's memory handling has been a disappointment to me. When I first installed it, it would optimize memory usage within a reasonably short time. Right now, all I have open are this page and Gmail and memory's still stuck solid at 200MB. The only extensions I have are DownThemAll, Skype, and Foxmarks...although Foxmarks is ridiculously bad on CPU usage, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was part of the problem, too. Still, this is a shame. Why should I bother even downloading the latest version on my other machines, particularly when I have to hassle with the "Awesome" Bar to keep it from keeping a history?
Ok, have been using FF3 since its official release, and have yet to see this memory issue. Not saying it isn't happening, just that the problems some of you are facing are not universal. Which begs the question, what is different here? I think we should start to focus on identifying common patterns between those that have this issue, and those that don't. Then see where the gap lies. Perhaps then we can determine the cause(s) of the memory issue.
Running FF 3.0.1 here on Mac OS 10.4.11 and Firefox is going over 300Mb of physical memory use and over 800Mb of virtual memory in about 2 hours of use (zimbra, gmail, and two or three other tabs of regular sites). I keep having to close and restart Firefox every two hours or so, or else it will get pretty sluggish.
One cause that I believe I have identified is the Netvibes site (which uses tons of Ajax/Javascript. If I leave that in an open tab for a couple of days then I see Firefox process usage in the several hundred megs. After a weekend it had actually topped one gigabyte of RAM usage (with one FF instance containing about 7 tabs).
Although this may be one of the causes, I don't believe it is acceptable. A web page should not be able to do this to a browser (and really to an OS) IMO.
Just noticed a couple of other weird things. I was reading a looong forum listing and to my horror I noticed that my old workhorse (P4 3.0 MHz, hyperthreading, 1.5GB, Vanta) was appallingly slow when I tried to scroll the page (lots of tables/rows/cells with images in the messages). I had to close the page and open it in IE7. No problems there. Once again we have the sluggish table behaviour, reminds me of the old 4.x Netscape.
Then another thing: I opened a couple of wikimedia images from a wiki page and moving the mouse over the image (800x600) made mouse VERY jerky and CPU usage jumped very high each time I moved the mouse. Once again no problems with IE. Then I tested the same pages using FF3 in a Sempron 2.8 with FX5500. No problems.
There seems to be a problem with FF and older graphics cards. I have noticed this several times before but now I did really proper testing and comparison with two other browsers (yes, Opera ran both of these test without problems as well).
I'm seeing the same thing, still using loads of memory. http://www.jpuddy.net/2008/07/20/firefox-3-vs-secure-certificates-and-authorities/
I often leave large amounts of tabs open in Firefox 3 for long periods of time and most recently found Firefox to not only be eating over 450MB of memory, but also chewing up over 80% CPU.
Oh my, Me going down the street and the "nice" neighbor hisses at me, and you going down the same street, and that neighbor smiles at you, that would mean, that something is wrong with me, right? All you FF jockies GET OFF IT!!
I don't use FF(Never will either), so memory loss here and there, it's gobbledigoog for me. Anyway, aren't these the same people(FF jockies) who once raved over IE?
5 tabs open, have been open for at least 14 hours, 10 extensions installed (not counting the 2 that aren't compatible with FF3 that I never got around to uninstalling after upgrading from FF2). 152 Megs of memory used. This is on 3.0.1.
Firefox 3 still a memory hog, Mahmoud Al-Qudsi still that stupid to waste everybody's time here. I am giving up reading your blog, pathetically wasting of time!
Are you getting payed by Microsoft to spread bad rumors my memory usage is now 115MB with 11 tabs open and its been that way for at least 6 hours
Since Firefox 3.0 release I have been plagued by "crashes" and reboots on XP. I have read other complaints about this problem also. It does seem to happen more often when starting to display a picture or a short video.
Do you think this is a memory problem for me? I only have 256 MB but probably need 1G. What do you think?
@Mahmoud Al-Qudsi: Did you ever find the cause of the issue. If I leave firefox open regardless of how many tabs are open, I swell to ~260MB w/in a few hours. It doesnt matter what extensions I have enabled, it seems like Firefox just swells and then stops at around ~260-~280. I never go above there though, unless FF freezes up.
-Nabil
It's caused by bad code, plain and simple.
Since using Windows more regularly (vs. Linux) I'm seeing much worse memory usage than before; with Firefox consistently above 300MiB for no good reason.
Firefox on Windows Vista x64 SP1 sucking up 550MiB of RAM after several hours of HTML pages:
I think the memory usage is partially depended on how large a page file you have. I hardly ever see Opera 9.52 use over 100 MB of ram. And when I plugged in a 2 GB SD card and used readyboost with it, my overall ram usage went down 4% and I have 2GB of ram on vista.
SwiftJun. 3rd, 2008 at 7:07 pm:
I havent seen 300 MIB but having just 3 tabs open it uses about 160 MB, which to me is pointing directly at the Code used in Fire Fox And my machine is clean as clean can be, so its not the machine but the code. I mean when FF came out originally back in 2004 it didnt use as much ram as it does today, i swear they are going down the Path that MS took when they Release new OS, Requires more ram, well MS is in a rut because Intel refuses to run it on their own corp machines.
Firefox 3 is way better than FF2, but there are definitely still memory leaks. I have to shut the browser down and restart a couple times a day as it becomes incredibly slow after a while, and task manager indicates memory use of 600-700 megabytes when it becomes noticeably slow.
That said I am using complex pages (e.g. facebook, gmail) but everything is always fine for a while, and the memory slowly creeps upwards over time. I don't have these pages open all the time either -- shutting down a tab does not restore the lost memory. I have to restart the whole browser.
Ok, Memory + Browsers + Lotsa Tabs = RamFeast. But why would ANYONE have 88 processes running during testing??? (see screenshot above) EVER!?! I have 18-22 at all times. Seems the people that publish this crap don't know their asus from their elbow.
I'm running 64-bit Firefox 3 on an Ubuntu Hardy box with 1 GB of RAM, and right after launch it's taking up 550mb of RAM. I have the Delicious and DownThemAll extensions running, though; I suppose Delicious could be doing it. I'll have to try removing it at some point (I could get away with a bookmark as I rarely use the sidebar.)
I have also the same Behavior.
I also have three systems, one is a Dual Boot desktop based AMD Semprom mobile, w 1GB RAM, has Ubuntu hardy and XP sp3, on both configurations have the same $hit, takes more than 400MB just after resuming the sesion.
The other machine is a Vista Home Premium Core 2 Duo 7700, never noted perfomance issues due has 4 GB of ram and 64bit OS, but FF stil use about 300-400 MB ram all the time.
This behavior isn't all the time, seems related with the kind of site you visited in your history, I discovered that cleaning the history the memory usage returns to normality, but after hours seeng videos at Youtube FF becomes a RAM EATER, the only way I found to minimize this behavios is to clean the history and close the tabs on where I saw YouTube videos (maybe a Flash- or plug-in Related Bug).
,my 2 cents.
I don't know what you're doing, but I've had my firefox open for a good 3 hours now with 3 tabs currently open and several extentions and it's only using 99,548K in my memory. I'm using vista and firefox version 3.0.1
FF3 eats up about 60 - 120 MB of my 1GB RAM....when it's transferring data to load up the website...I had to forcefully increase my RAM through RAM Saver Pro because of it...
Just got home after about 4 hours out and I left FF3 running. I had 688MB of usage from FF3 and also a message from XP telling me it was out of memory. This is the first time it has happened but it is not unusual for it to get up to 150MB on a normal day. I cannot remember what pages I left open though.
I have Firefox 3.0.2
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.0.2)
Gecko/2008090514 Firefox/3.0.2
It typically gobbles up memory so fast, it reaches 1.8 GB routinely,
and I have to restart it.
Virtual Size: Private Bytes:
Initial (Wednesday) : ~ 180,000 K ~ 104,000 K (I didn’t write them down, but I remember the Private one was 104)
After running
overnight Wed
(Thursday, 10:25 AM) : 1,124,248 K 1,024,728 K
After restart
(Thursday, 10:30 AM) : 178,912 K 106,732 K
Didn’t do anything except
let FF3 sit there minimized since
restart, until afternoon
(Thursday, 3:52 PM) : 387,808 K 317,300 K
FireFox3 seems to be consuming memory at the rate of about 50 K / second ! I can watch it count up in the Process Explorer window;
it’s like a digital stopwatch counting upwards. In the time it’s taken me to type this last sentence or two, the numbers are now:
388,832 K 322,852 K
After running overnight
(Friday, 9:10 AM): 1,042,536 K 945,556 K
(numbers from SysInternals’ Process Explorer v11.13)
System Info:
————
OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 2 Build 2600
OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation
System Name cfdgfdfgd
System Manufacturer Dell Inc.
System Model OptiPlex GX620
System Type X86-based PC
Processor x86 Family 15 Model 4 Stepping 3 GenuineIntel ~3391 Mhz
Processor x86 Family 15 Model 4 Stepping 3 GenuineIntel ~3391 Mhz
BIOS Version/Date Dell Inc. A05, 10/13/2005
SMBIOS Version 2.3
Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS
System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume2
Locale United States
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = “5.1.2600.2705 (xpsp.050622-1524)”
User Name XXXXXXX
Time Zone Central Daylight Time
Total Physical Memory 4,096.00 MB
Available Physical Memory 1.52 GB
Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB
Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB
Page File Space 3.53 GB
Page File C:\pagefile.sys
Addons:
——-
Aardvark 2.96
Adblock 0.5.3.043
ColorfulTabs 3.4 (disbled)
CoLT 2.4.1
Copy All Urls 0.8.0
DT Whois
Flashblock 1.5.6 (turned on)
IE View 1.3.7
Linky 2.7.1
Location Navigator 0.6.2 (disabled)
lori (Life-of-request info) 0.2.0.20080521
No-Referer 1.3.1
Page Title Eraser 0.7.6 (disabled)
QuickJava 0.4.2.1
UI Tweaker (Formerly Toolbar Cleanup) 1.7.0
Web Site Tabs:
————–
Sigh. All these people with "10 tabs open and after 3 hours no problems". Please, please read what we tell you: If you WORK with FF3 things get very, very different. And by work I do not mean reading slashdot.org or other porn sites. I mean that you work with pages that have AJAX, lot of javascript, extensions. Interactive sites, you know.
I develop web applications and know exactly how this bloody thing works. It is a LOT better than version 2 but still far from what it should be.
Well, I can live with this pile of * now but some friends of mine who are updating websites and uploading files are moving to other browsers with the brand new "file upload field" by Firefox. It is the worst invention ever. Why? Read the following
You have filled in a long form. The last field is "add image" and you click on the field and accidentally select a file from your file system. There is no way of clearing the field. Nope. None. Oh, you can reload the form and refill the things you filled in earlier. Try that. It is the worst "feature" ever introduced in a browser.
Why am I using Firefox? Not because of FF itself but because of a couple of extensions that only work with FF. FF itself is pure crap.
@MKN:
Ok. So what you are saying is that, for 99.9% of all people who "use" (not "work") with a browser, FF3 is fine. Just that .1% (like you) who do all sorts of abnormal activities (abnormal relative to the 99.9% of typical users) will have issues?
@Steve:
Something like that. But that said, it does not tell anything about the quality of code let alone the fact that the memory management still sucks. Or, to put it in another situation: I have been driving a car for 33 years now and never needed a safety belt. Still I understand very well people (1% of people I know) who claim that it has saved their life. So percentages alone do not tell much.
Just like Outlook Express with POP3 is absolutely fine with people who get, say, 2-4 emails per day, mostly from a couple of good friends. A heavy user with dozens of emails and problems with spam (like myself with around 30.000 spams per month) will look for something more robust.
As I said I only use Firefox because there are some real good extensions (Firebug, Colorzilla, Web developer - AND AdBlock!). There are worse issues with FF today than the memory usage which one really can live with.
btw: uploading files is absolutely not an "abnormal activity" and all uploaders suffer from the brave new "upload field".
@MKN:
Don't get me wrong, I think the memory management sucks...but it would explain why "tests" from other users have not replicated what you and some others are seeing. I had always been confused about that and initially attributed it to some other application (not addon) interfering with FFs calls. Now it makes sense.
I am assuming that this information has gotten to the Mozilla folks so they can work on it? Hope it did and they are! I would hate to have to start using IE again :)
Not to open a can of worms but... How about Chrome? ;-) As for Ff3... Maybe my browsing habits have changed but I'm getting less memory issues these days. There are some Flash problems on occasion, which also affect Chrome (sometimes even more so than Ff) but my browsing experience isn't as bad now as it was when Ff3 came out. Anybody knows if something changed in terms of memory management, in Firefox 3.0.1?
Unfortunately while we have had many Mozilla/Firefox developers drop by and comment on our Firefox complaint stories telling us we weren't providing quality information and were leaping to conclusions (for instance, this story: http://neosmart.net/blog/2006/firefox-copy-paste-bug-fixed/), we haven't seen them address or even acknowledge any of the issues we raise here.
Another thing bugging me is that whenever I several tabs open and in one of them I happen to have a single medium-size (or bigger) jpeg image the mouse pointer gets very jerky when just moving over the tab part. The mouse literally stops for about 1/3 seconds when the pointer is on the JPEG-containing tab. I can replicate this without problems. I have a fairly low-end computer (P4 3.0 HT with a Vanta card) and only a couple of gigs of memory :)
As for Chrome I see a great promise in it - when we get some good extensions. I really mean it looks and feels good and seems to have a very healthy programming model.
Don't count on Chrome getting too comfy with extensions - one of the reasons Google saw Firefox as less than ideal and probably one of the reasons they ended up developing Chrome is because of extensions like AdBlock and others that make end-users' lives lovely, but are a bit of a liability for the corporations out there.
Mahmoud,
I am well aware of the sad fact that Chrome will probably never get any AdBlock-like functionality. But: just for the fun of it I started FF3 yesterday, about 18 hours ago when Opera had already been running with 5-6 tabs several hours. Most of the time the five-to-six tabs have been the same (same servers, same applications).
http://tinyurl.com/3zbbvv
Now Firefox3 is at 400 MB whereas Opera is at 50 MB. There is very little I can do about the problem apart from closing Firefox every now and then.
I'm sitting here at the moment watching a new re-install the current FF3 on an XP SP 3 machine, eating around 8KB of memory a minuet with only a blank page loaded and NO add-ons or extensions installed.
IE 7/8, Chrome and Opera all run fine.
These problems are real.
I hadn't had the memory problem in a while (since installing Firefox 3, I think). But today I went on a bit of a trashy celebrity web site rampage (I've found in the past that those sites are just loaded with spyware crap). Several hours after the trashy celebrity page binge, I'd shut all but one Firefox window, and the memory use was at 200M and growing. Spybot says I don't have any spyware, and there are no weird processes in the Task Manager, aside from one Firefox window taking up 200M+. I haven't installed any new extensions lately.
I don't want any part of Chrome, but I wonder if Firefox could do the Chrome trick, where each page/tab is a separate process, so if you kill the bad page, the memory problem is solved. Or perhaps every page would be bad, so you'd have 20 200M processes.
Sorry... you're flat out wrong.
Mine runs between 75 MB and 180 MB... average is usually right around 100 MB.
I have several extensions and have MANY tabs open for MOST of the work day.
There's a big difference between our being "flat out wrong" and Firefox fanboys being in denial.
You can't prove a negative - especially not by just citing one occasion where you didn't see this problem happen. Just because you don't experience a memory leak that doesn't mean it doesn't exist... but the fact that millions of other people have memory leak issues means that it most certainly does.
I have also noticed firefox 3 to be a big memory hog. And this morning was worse than ever. Check out my screenshot. Firefox uses over 1GB of memory. I can't type more than 4-5 words at a time in a text box or window before Firefox pauses. I am starting to get really annoyed with it. And I have used Firefox since it first came out but this is ridiculous. I am thinking of switching to a different browser.
Don't know what happened to the screenshot but you can find it at:
Here
At work on RHEL4, I see 500+ MB footprint. At home on Ubuntu Hoary it is pretty similar. Right now FF is up to 496MB on my home machine. I had to restart it a few days ago because it was 700+ and causing horrible system performance. I tried closing all the tabs except for one and hardly any memory was freed. FF is taking memory and not letting go. Truly, there are still some issues with FF, the "lightweight, faster" version of mozilla.
Hello Mahmoud,
I found this post by doing a google search for "Firefox memory hog", and I couldn't agree with you more. I'm running Vista Ultimate 64-bit, and Firefox is using over 1.5GB of RAM with only 4 tabs open, and only 3 addons (Download Statusbar, Google Redesigned, and Skype extension).
Here is a screenshot of my Task Manager, as well as Firefox's version and addon tabs, so you can see what I mean.
I don't recall IE ever growing to such a large size ever... I may switch to it permanently.
I googled for "firefox memory hog" and found my way here. The reason I googled for that term? Firefox regularly takes up 320mb ram just doing normal browsing. I was kinda hoping I might find a few tips on reducing it's memory usage, but I can see that I don't need to do anything. My observations were "flat out wrong"... :) Interactive sites do seem to give FF3 a problem. Faceboook is one example. FF will sit at 60mb when opened, but hit facebook and it takes off.
Funnily enough, like the people before me I have found this page after looking for "firefox memory hog" in Google. I'm currently using Firefox 3.0.3 under Mac OS X and it's common that Firefox uses around 300 MB physical RAM (or more). I've observed that the memory usage spikes when you visit sites which use a lot of JavaScript. For instance, running Mozilla's very own JavaScript test on http://dromaeo.com/ adds another 100 MB to RAM and Firefox only releases a few MB after some time. Maybe somethings wrong with the garbage collection in Spidermonkey?
Anyway, it could be worse: It could be Safari, which eats memory like there's no tomorrow :-P
Like many others, I came to this page via google on firefox 3 memory leak, due to concerns over how Firefox seems to eat memory for lunch. I have 2GB on a Windows XP install. I never have more than 4 or 5 tabs open at a time and usually less than that. When browsing various sites in what I would consider a fairly normal way - ie html pages, not tons of video or flash etc, FF3 starts at about 100 MB memory and starts to grow slowly but steadily from there - after 10 minutes of regular browsing I'm now at 145MB, and after a couple of hours of this I get up to 450 - 500 MB and the system starts to crawl and I have to restart.
There's nothing unusual about my XP install, it's a typical PC, couple years old.
First of all, reading through past submissions, I found myself quite irritated by the "flat earthers" in there who refuse to believe that any memory leak issues exist in FF3 simply because they don't seem to show up on their machines. I'm a typical PC user, I have no agenda with Microsoft or anybody else, and on the whole I like FF3 and use it in preference to other browsers. Nevertheless I had these issues in FF2, I upgraded because one of the supposed key benefits was better memory management, but if anything FF3 performs worse in that dept on my machine than FF2 did.
I have no plans to uninstall FF3 and go back to IE7, but I do find that this memory issue frustrates me day to day usage of this browser and makes me wary of recommending it.
Gah. I don't have that many extensions (Firebug, Adblock, Chickenfoot, Roboform, MeasureIt and the Colour) yet I'm restarting FF almost everyday now due to FF hogging too much memory (400MB+ ~ 500MB+ sometime during the day and I just killed it a moment ago with 700MB+).
That's what got me into googling for "Firefox hogging memory" just now.
If only Chrome of Safari would support Firebug and the roboform extension I'd dump FF already.
Chek out the tweaks at the following site:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20125122-Tweaking-for-FunSpeed-Fx-v3-Series
I was having all sorts of problems and have installed the tweaks along with turning off most of my add-ins. FF3 CPU usage is down considerably, from 60-70% to well less than 20%. I also pound it pretty well - 2 windows open with a total of 27 tabs open, quite a few of which are running flash/java. My mem usage is high - about 403M on a 1G system. But given the windows/tabs combination I'm not too worried about it.
Still have to assess the long term stability.
Ken
I develop quite a complex app. using ExtJS & YUI & 50+ JS classes, the problem is that FF3 doesn't release memory on page reload, so it uses 1GB+ after 10-20 reloads.
@Swift have a look to your virtual memory
Using the tweak provided I definitely have lower memory usage - but I also have 5+ fatal errors during the day. Didn't have that before, so I need to look at the tweaks and see if I can determine which one might be guilty. Weill post if I figure it out.
Ken
I agree with Swift, on my vista machine it starts right off at 80mb and then goes anywhere between 120mb and 135mb.
Forgot to say, I run over 15 extensions and have 4.00gb ram on a vista machine with x64 OS and processor architecture.
There is not a memory leak as such, but memory used by tabs is not being released properly.
I can replicate the high memory usage, by loading 10 tabs, closing them, loading another, closing them, and on and on.
It is also not a result of bfcache, as that has been set to 0(disabled)
I replicated this on a clean profile in Firefox, and all the nay sayers i urge to try it themselves.
Firefox 2.0 infact used less memory because of this problem then 3.0 does.
@Squall Leonhart: Okay...had never seen this happen before, but ran the test you suggested and sure enough...shot to above 125K and stayed at around 116K after I closed all the tabs.
Interesting. Thanks.
Sorry...that should read 125Mb of course (and 116Mb)...sigh...
No problem Steve, I've been using 3.0 since beta 2, and its happened from then all the way till now with the 3.1 nightlies,
I've loaded a session using session manager extension and saved them all as bookmarks, so i could use it in the fresh profile
Clean profile fresh start w BFcache disabled, is 51MB's. Load all the tabs at once(44), takes me up to 236MB's
Close all tabs except for 1, memory usage dials back to 170MB, again.
Having used firefox 2.0 heavily previously, 50 or so tabs would use 240ish MB's, and with BFCache set to 1 would dial back to 125MB's, Opening a few tabs with a google search in them then closing them would at this point dial memory back to 90MB's.
My own theory on it is that the memory used by images in a tab is not being released as it is more noticeable when sites with many images, or large hi res images are closed. I'm going to raise the issue at mozillazine and get some good reprosteps down, i'll also build a places.sql file which has sites which agravate the problem.
@Squall Leonhart: Are you saying you're seeing memory increases from peak to peak, or from trough to trough? What I mean by this is the following:
Start with one tab open (call this low number L1) Open ten tabs (and call this higher number H1) close the ten tabs (call this L2) open ten tabs again (call this H2) etc.
Measuring memory usage from L1 to L2 to L3, etc., is going to tell you how good the implementation of malloc and free is at returning memory to the system, how fragmented the allocations end up, etc. It's not clear if this graph is very meaningful to what users experience.
Measuring memory usage from H1 to H2 to H3, etc., is much more likely to yield useful information, and I think is more likely to reflect whether those users who aren't looking at task manager are actually perceiving memory use problems.
David, I'm not 'that' technical however i will try to clarify what im seeing.
i created a second test profile just for this lol.
Fresh start with bfcache disabled, is 49MB's at this point.
Ok, using 10 sites opening them twice each.
forums.ngemu.com, redcl0ud.1.forumer.com, onemanga.com, forum.pj64-emu.com, www.jabosoft.com, forum.nhancer.com/, www.msghelp.net/, www.ngohq.com, community.mybboard.net and mail.live.com
thats about 77MB's used.
right click a tab and click close others
this dials down to 72MB's.
Open the same tabs again, takes us up to 89MB's
Closing them again takes us down to 84MB's
Opening those same Tabs again takes us to 96MB, and closing them takes us down to 90MB.
Ok, at this point, im at 90MB, im going to open the same tabs 4 times each, so thats 40 open tabs.
Theres 125MB's. closing them takes us back to 103.
Now this was a controlled example, obviously we aren't going to be loading the same sites 4 times each, and data and images differening in each tabs is going to hit on memory usage much more.
I downloaded and installed a Windows XP update that fixes a GDI memory leak:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=9b5edfc8-a4bb-4080-9063-6518166e2dab&displayLang=en
and after that, FF3 memory has been very stable. I've been running this about 3 or 4 days now, and FF3 memory use is OK. So maybe that will fix the problem. I would like to hear feedback from others.
That update is months old, and has no bearing on the problem at hand.
a GDI memory leak can be easily destinquished in the GDI objects columb in task manager
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=464648
Not to mention its stupidity on not using the cached jpg, page source etc etc...
ie. save image -> download again. view source (some websites) -> make duplicate request and resend unnecessary information, which could really screw up if you're buying stuff online!!
I've been running at or around 240mb to 300mb on a WinXP machine with 2 gigs of ram. I run two browser windows on a large lcd with only a single tab in each. It starts off ok and stays around 100mb but after a while it just gets out of control. Restarting only works for a short time. I wish this issue was given more attention as I honestly will have to look at going with another browser if nothing changes. I'm sure a nice new quadcore with 5 gigs of ram would help, but then thats not the point of using FF in the first place.
This memory problem most certainly does exist. I had the same problem in FF2 and, having just now upgraded to FF3, am seeing the same problem as before. I am sitting at 462,320 KB of usage right now and it's climbing as I type. I've only had the browser open for about an hour. I do not have these memory problems at all in IE, Opera or Chrome (Google's new browser). It's something in FF.
In the amount of time it took me to type that, I am now at 467,124 KB. And I type fast. :)
1.1 GB for a fucking document viewer!?
Yes, I searched for "firefox memory hog" and yes, it's true.
Not sure if this will help anyone but I did an increases in my pagefile and now my memory usage has gone down considerably. I ran one instance of FF3 with 23 tabs open about half of which have "active content" like streaming stock quotes, weather map updates, etc. I actually reach a peak memory usage (according to Task Manager) of 1.7G (in a 2G system)!
I increased my pagefile size (i just added the 2nd Gig a week ago) to 3069M with a max of 4500M. With the same number of tabs open to the same pages (though the content may be more or less active) my current mem usage is 154K and my VM size (which I wasn't tracking before is 365M.
My processor usage by FF3 is lower as well though I can actually quantify the difference.
I also added FreeRamPro (a free download from download.net). Not sure if it has helped but it certainly hasn't hurt.
Ken
Memory freeing apps are useless on XP, all they do is flush all the loaded dll's into the paged memory and slow explorer down.
As for firefox, the paged memory should only exceed the private memory if privatememory runs low.
I understand what you saying but what I'm seeing doesn't fit that scenario. With FreeRamPro (FRP) running I'm sitting at less than 200M for 23 tabs. Three straight times I've quit FRP and immediately FF3 has start to climb in memory used. And in each case the paged memory (VM size in Task Manager) has been 2.3 to 3x the size of the RAM used.
As I type this the mem used is sitting at 245M after closing FRP. I restart it and FF3 drops back and is now at 150M. And it stays somewhat consistent varying only by 20M or so up and down. Might just be a quirk with my system but that's what I'm seeing. Maybe someone can see the relationship (IF there is one) and figure out a consistent fix for everyone.
Ken
VM is not paged memory.
From all the comments above, it might be caused by Adblock or DownThemAll. Please disable those extension and try again.
I think I can now confirm a pattern which, however, makes very little sense to me. I remember recording a memory problem the first time two years ago when I upgraded my workstation from 512 MB to 1.5 GB. When the problems started I suspected that a bad FF upgrade has produced a memory leak.
Now in my home office I have two almost identical computers. The one I am using for web development has only 1 GB and the other (for testing) has 1.5 GB. I have the same FF extensions in both computers - actually the "smaller" one has even more of those.
I have been observing the memory usage for several weeks now. The pattern is clear: even though I use the "bigger" one less often it tends to chomp awful amounts of memory - much more than the one with less memory. This is EXACTLY what happened with FF2 two years ago. In the office we had two workstations with 1.5+ GB and maybe four with 0.5-1 GB. The only workstations that started crawling with FF2 were the ones with a lot of memory.
As of writing this the FF I am using behaves well (131 MB) whereas the less-active testing workstation FF is consuming 490 MB and needs a restart. The browsers have been active roughly the same time. The memory use on the 1GB computer rarely exceeds 300 MB whereas that limit is normally reached within an hour with the other one. The funniest thing is that I use the FF in the 1GB computer is at least 5x compared with the more idle one. Moreover, I am visiting much more varied sites with the no-problems computer. Oh, and the same goes for my wife's computer: it works beautifully having just 768 MB and she has all the same extensions. She also visits an awful number of weird sites :) All these computers are 24/7, never turned off.
As I said I have been suspecting this for almost two years now and now I am PRETTY sure about it even though I have no explanation whatsoever. It is just plain weird: the more memory I have the hungrier Firefox is.
The next thing I will do is minimize virtual memory in the 1.5 GB computer and see what happens.
thats the BFcache, the more memory you have, the more pages are cached/
BFcache may well be a good candidate but I not think it explains everything. In the office the memory use increased with nothing happening in FF. No page refreshes, at night or during a weekend when nobody touched the keyboard or there was any self-refreshing page open. In our intranet application we had one simple, single Ajax call that occurred once or minute or so and it only updated one status icon and NEVER refreshed the page (I understand BFcache 'back/forward' is used for this purpose).
During a week of computer idling (business trip) we succeeded in breaking the record, though: we crossed the 2 GB border of FF memory usage. This was FF2, though, I admit.
If, however, BFCache (or any other hidden feature) is to blame then FF has a severe problem. There is not much a normal user can do to without a lot of digging and tweaking - there are no settings for memory usage unless one steps onto the minefield at "about:config".
The default installation settings should ALWAYS work without tweaking. If any changes are needed there should be an easily accessible setting in the preferences window tabs.
All in all the Firefox development team seems to have a severe attitude problem which is most obvious in the "upload file" field horror. It is almost as bad in accepting the fact that the users are really having problems with the memory issues.
i think you all have a serious problem with your computer! my firefox 3 takes only 50mb of ram and yours up to 200mb :S thats crazy
Fail, firefox takes up 60mb on load, so theres no way yours is only using 50.
I'm now running the Beta 2 for 3.1 and it seems much better behaved. I currently have 25 tabs open and the memory load is 371M. Last week, running a similar load under 3.01 I was routinely in the 500M range. I run very few extensions.
Ken
Firefox 3.1 beta 2, and the compiled prereleases since 20th of November have been much better at memory management.
The cycle collectors have been improved greatly, and Firefox now doesn't take more then a minute to close completely after having used it for awhile.
~300mb on a daily basis. 300mb for a web browser is a little excessive, dont you think?
It is slightly grating that FF advocates (and let me make it clear that I use FF, not IE) frequently resort to denial when problems like this are raised. A little self-criticism is healthy. Since so many people are complaining about this, and there have been mea culpas from the developers, and considerable efforts to improve memory management, we can reasonably conclude that it's more than "a problem with your computer".
My experience is that there is no discernable difference between FF3 and FF2 in memory usage. Both manage memory appallingly badly. To give you an example: I have just restarted FF3 with around twenty tabs open, after many hours of intensive surfing yesterday and after having that particular instance open for several days. When I restarted, physical memory usage was at around 900MB, and virtual memory usage at 1.5GB. Windows XP was giving me warnings about VM being too small. As I write, a few minutes after restarting, PM usage is at 177MB and VM at 166MB. For the SAME tabs, plus this one.
I spent many hours yesterday trawling through images of skyscrapers, trying to identify all the buildings in my NYC photos. Some of the pages I opened were blogs about two miles long (I hate those pages). In my experience, it's those kind of image-intensive pages that really cause the memory usage spikes. Once consumed, much of this memory is apparently never freed.
I just wonder: is this a generation of developers that thinks the garbage collector will do it all for you?
There seems to be a conflict between the cycle collector and certain internet security / antivirus software, In my case its Kaspersky 2009, currently posting from a system without it running and memory usage is below 200mb even though i've left it open all night with facebook open (uses flash for the chat system)
I couldn't do that with one of my other systems that run kaspersky, I'm considering going back a version because i was able to fix it in that version by removing the NDIS Filter driver that kaspersky uses.
difference on vista = max 300MB, instead of 1.4GB on XP = Max 330MB instead of 800MB
FF3 is great. The only time I experience a memory hog and slowing down of things to almost a freeze is when I open two separate profiles. Closing one of the profiles sets the things back to normal.
I use FF3 on Arch Linux and generally have anywhere between 20 to 30 tabs open for almost 10 hours at a stretch without freezing or slowing the browser down. I use developer extensions mostly. Sometimes I experience freezing when I visit some sites that are running some kind of a client side script. Closing the tab or restarting the browser sets the things right.
My system is a Centrino laptop with 512 MB RAM. Except for the simultaneous multiple profile thing, FF is a good browser.
you're deludedd. aside from that fact
I've discovered the cause of my high memory usage to be caused by the mozilla 3 virtual keyboard driver that is installed by Kaspersky 2009.
FF3 open for around 6 hours on my laptop. ATM 2 instances with 5 tabs total, using 311MB. This is why I use Chrome.
I've recently opened Firefox 3 and it's using 131MB of RAM with 4 tabs open. However if I go onto my bank's website (HSBC), PayPal, FaceBook or a load of other different sites it lags, freezes then tries eating a tasty 300-500MB of RAM. (That's just with one tab open too!)
It might be a problem with them sites, not sure but I mean HSBC or at least PayPal shouldn't be like that ... I never had the problem with FF2, but don't wish to downgrade.
Oh, I'm using Windows Vista Home Basic (SP1).
There IS a memory problem with Firefox 3. I'm working on a laptop which recently was downsized to 256Mb RAM (thanks Asus for using RAM that is hell to find), and I'm getting really annoyed with the amount of memory that F3 is using. Opening a blank page eats up as much as 50Mb RAM!!! What for? I didn't pay much attention before, beacause I had 256Mb more to suck it up, but now until I find more RAM I must mind which sites I use and what programs are opened at the same time. And the thing most annoying is that F3 DOESN'T release memory significantly when you close a tab or, and even lag when you close down the browser! I should probably consider going to another open-source browser.
LOL, dude, gtfo k. only reason why IE uses 20mb with a blank page is because most of its necessary dll's and stuff are already loaded in explorer.exe.
50MB sounds perfectly normal for a browser with nothing loaded.
this times, mozilla too lucky there are no competitor
so we useing urs disgusting slowest,buggy browser!
i remember firebird, Phoenix, can u remember how many tabs open it ? how fast is it ? i looking firefox cache directory, its seem 300~MB but this disgusting browser taking 2GB virtual memory 1.7Gbprivate 1.5GB working set! memory!
what sh** is in that ???
pls dont advice to use this browser or dnt use.. im active useing kmeleon (now sending),firefox1,5,2,3 minefieldx64(bestever, becouse not mozilla devloping!) bonecho tete editon etc.
uar dev.ing new version ,, its not bad , but why we cant install old extension ?
bcouse urs create new app. and new compile or what the sh** is it need to that extension ?
did u know microsoft app ? did u run any 16-32 bit app in win64 ?? did u hear backward compatibility ?
of course all of us abouse microsoft but they have incredibly backward comp. look ubuntu they give us 2 year support, look mozilla 1-2 year support its product most opensource project seems this..sda
anyways! mozilla browser nothing whitout extension !!! personaly hateing google but i supports its browser, why? its need competitor, really hard competitor! (im not installed chrome and illnot install)
mozilla!
have a goog wan,
did u belive this!!i bought 4gig memory for this sh*** product!!! totaly disappointment..
last word, recommend kmemlon+adp (gecko hear!) its enought!
I don't think Firefox 3 likes Vista 64. I recently did a clean install of Vista 64 (previously used Vista 32), and it's hogging 400MB+ of RAM. Plus it gets worse as time goes by. On Vista 32, it never went over 200MB, so this quite a surprise. I thought the memory troubles were finally over with when I upgraded from Firefox 2.. sigh.
I've used Firefox 3.1a2 and Minefield version 3.2a1pre, I'm using 50mb right now. However, when I load Zynga poker (on myspace - a memory intensive flash application) it will skyrocket up to 312mb. I set my about:config max memory consumption to 256mb. Note: it will still use more than that and go to the paging file if it needs to.
First of all, my FF3 doesnt even go over 50Mbit usually, ive seen it go over 60Mbit once. And moreover, if your computer cant handle a browser taking 300mbps use, i recommend updating the gear a bit. Ok, it's easy to say when you have 8gbit RAM but anyway, everything is updating, including the memory usages of softwares, and people should stay in tune with them.
A good trick for overall performance on any computer is setting the virtual memory to a fixed size. On XP, go to your system properties. Advanced. Performance Settings. Advanced. Virtual memory. Change. Now set to a custom size. Set as high as your disk space allows within reason. Ideal minimum is 1024. (1 gig) I'm using 2048 (2 gigs) and it works fine. Initial size: 2048 Maximum size: 2048
It's very important to set them to the same amount. This is how you gain performance over using the system managed size. It's a very expensive disk operation to keep resizing a several hundred meg (or file over a gig) and windows can do that several times a minute if you don't use this tweak. After confirming your settings, restart and defragment your disk drive. You will notice a speed increase.
@Uhm
Why should anybody have to update their hardware to compensate for shoddy programming? Google just has delivered a highly memory efficient and fast browser. Disregarding the process model Chrome uses for tabs, even the constanstly running Chromium process itself releases memory if not used for some time (down to 10 MB on my machine).
All claims about FF3 being a memory hog are real and replicable. Once minimized, memory is not virtualized, also once tabs are closed, memory still is not released. I have disabled about 3 extensions and there is barely any reduction in the memory footprint. Same results on Vista, Ubuntu and XP.
I use a multiple desktop software Dexpot that allows me to create multiple "workspaces". Combined that with all the web development I do, the web dev extensions, and the fact that FF3 does not clean up after itself until you turn it off (sometime it still exists as a zombie process), FF3 usually eats up 300 ~ 450 MB...
Firefox 3.x has made some modest improvements over memory, but the programming is indeed shoddy. A significant number of people who actually monitor their computer's memory use have reported this problem. Duh. And if each of us will only stand on our heads, hold our breath, click our heels three times, do a complete system diagnostic, and become physicists, maybe we can find the explanation.
Or maybe Firefox can honestly deal with this issue. Fact is, I'm running Dreamweaver, Firefox, Flash, Word, Excel, and the Browsers Opera, Safari (PC), and IE 6 and 7 on my 3 machines for web development. None of the other programs match the resource-hogging of Firefox. Also, none of them refuses to exit the way Firefox does - so that if I should restart it, I have the warning that a Firefox process is already running! (Yet another problem that Firefox needs to confess to and fix).
This is decidely a per configuration issue, rather then a issue directly in firefox. The IS program you have installed might be a factor.
@Squall-How's that sand taste?
I'm beginning to think there is a definite hardware component to the problem or at least a hardware driver issue. I have two HP laptops (DV5000 and DV9000). Both running fully updated XP Media Center. The same version of FF# running on each laptop with the same tabs open is much more memory efficient on the DV9000 than the DV5000 (215M versus more than 490M).
Ken
well Colm, you pathetic little badger, if you read up, i too had the memory use issue.
It turned out A component of KIS 2009, in this case, the mozilla keyboard hookin, was causing Firefox's Cycle/Garbage collection to fail to work properly.
Use Process Explorer to check the Firefox Process for DLL's it uses. One of them might be the cause. Renaming of the mozilla keyboard driver prevents it from loading thus fixing the issue on my XP desktop's, and Vista notebook.
Before i did the renaming. Firefox starts @ 60MB Opening 200Tabs, firefox rises to 350MB Closing them all it drops back to 300MB
After Firefox starts @ 60MB Opening 200Tabs, firefox rises to 280MB Closing them all it drops back to 110-140MB
Mind you, this is with my 25+ Extensions enabled
Adblock Plus 1.0.1 BBCode 0.5.2.4 Cache Status 0.7.8 ChromEdit Plus 2.7.2 Console² 0.3.10 CookiePie 1.0.3 [DISABLED] CustomizeGoogle 0.76 Download Statusbar 0.9.6.4 eBay Toolbar 0.3.8 English (Australian) Dictionary 2.1.1 Facebook Notifications 1.1 Firefox Companion for eBay 1.6.9 Flashblock 1.5.8a2 FlashGot 1.1.7.7 free-downloads.net Toolbar 1.5.48.2 Google Toolbar for Firefox 5.0.20090122Wb2 IE Tab 1.5.20081203 Image Toolbar 0.6.5 Image Zoom 0.3.1 Java Console 6.0.12 Java Quick Starter 1.0 Leak Monitor 0.4.2 [DISABLED] Minimize To Tray Enhancer 0.7.5.3 MinimizeToTray 1.0.0.20080518 Net Usage Item 1.2.216 Nightly Tester Tools 2.0.2 OpenSearchFox 0.1.5 Session Manager 0.6.3.3 Sourceforge Direct Download 0.5 SQLite Manager 0.4.3 StatusbarEx 0.2.17 Tab Mix Plus 0.3.7.4pre.090107 Torrent Finder Toolbar 1.2.4 translator 1.0.4.4 User Agent Switcher 0.6.11 Veoh Web Player Video Finder 1.4
well Colm, you pathetic little badger, if you read up, i too had the memory use issue.
It turned out A component of KIS 2009, in this case, the mozilla keyboard hookin, was causing Firefox's Cycle/Garbage collection to fail to work properly.
Use Process Explorer to check the Firefox Process for DLL's it uses. One of them might be the cause. Renaming of the mozilla keyboard driver prevents it from loading thus fixing the issue on my XP desktop's, and Vista notebook.
Before i did the renaming. Firefox starts @ 60MB Opening 200Tabs, firefox rises to 350MB Closing them all it drops back to 300MB
After Firefox starts @ 60MB Opening 200Tabs, firefox rises to 280MB Closing them all it drops back to 110-140MB
Mind you, this is with my 25+ Extensions enabled
Is it possible FF consumes memory based on the amount of available system RAM? I see posts all over of people claiming their 512MB systems run fine. My 6 year old home machine has 1GB RAM and runs great. However, my work PC with dual-core CPU and 4GB RAM, routinely sees FF consume 800-1GB+ of RAM. It becomes virtually unusable as it then pauses/hangs every 10-15 seconds or so. I have the exact same extensions installed on both of these machines, they have the same OS, etc... Why does the [much] lower-end machine run FF so much better?
2 Values increase depending on how much memory you have, but only one of them really impacts on it
the default value of browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers effects the BFCache and has it scale with the amount of memory installed, however its completely useless for people who open and close tabs rather then browsing in one, and only tends to eat memory with no need.
Forcing it to 1 or 2 minimizes the memory usage of the BFCache.
I've had a similar issue with Firefox 2/3. If I left it open for too long, my entire system would crawl. I had to close it down completely and reopen it. I could see the memory go up and up in the task manager. I just had to shut down Firefox after it hit 320+MB before I posted this message; and I only had 3 Firefox windows open... When this happens I tend to switch to IE7 in my frustration. I'd rather have a bug or two versus dealing with a damn memory leak.
I disabled the Firebug Add-on and all is well!! FF was becoming almost unusable as it would climb to over 1GB RAM, constantly lag and pause and eventually crash.
Since disabling Firebug, FF has not been over 150MB RAM even though it's been running with multiple tabs for over 3 days.
When I first noticed things had improved with FB disabled I re-enabled it and then simply turned it "off" while I worked to see if that would produce the same results. No dice. Still had same problem. FB must still eat RAM even when not in use. Disabled it from the add-on window and I have my FF back!!
When I need Firebug I'll just enable it again, I suppose. But during my normal use it stays disabled. Pity. It's a rather useful tool.
Lastly, did a search on the subject and found a string of what looks to be the FB author trying to explain how FB handles RAM. If you're interested: http://groups.google.com/group/firebug/browse_thread/thread/3ae2b3a2627c173d?pli=1
Enough defending it! This fu..king Firefox eat memory like a damn crazy! I hate it! In fact i always did! I am only using it because its secure. But from other angles, it just sucks like shit! Knowledge the problem and do something about it, you fu..king Firefox gurus, and stop shouting around the world "Firefox is best"! Its damn not! And that's a fact! Sorry for my language, but it just pissed me off completely...
Just not seeing the memory issues that others are complaining about. Not that I do not believe them but it would be nice to know if those that are complaining have any third party programs that filter or do av scanning on program loading as well as scanning well online for spyware and viruses. Also programs that install security programs have been known to cause issues.
I run Fx 3.0.7, 3.1b4, 3.2b1pre and memory usage w/ 64 extensions on each Fx never exceeds 150mb which is fine with me because I know I am running some obsolete extensions that consume memory. If I disable the problematic extensions memory usuage drops into the 60-80 depending on how many dozen tabs are open.
IE is really a poor browser to compare to as it is so intertwined in the OS that no accurate amount of memory usage IMO is available. Opera does use less memory but is still has issues with rendering and freezing up so that is not an option for me nor is its limited feature set YMMV.
Suffice it to say this is reproduced. Granted, there's a larger than normal number of tabs open, but if I close all of them except one, it doesn't drop below 1GB of usage. It's been this way since 1.5 - I've grown used to it and added RAM to compensate.
[img]http://www.theheywoodfiles.com/images/Firefox.PNG[/img]
Then theres an issue with your system and not firefox itself.
I've noticed that if I open, then minimize Windows Task Manager, my hard drive isn't being accessed as much, and my CPU usage is below 10%, vs. much higher.
Anyone else notice this?
Thanks.
Except that Firefox does that on every system I've owned since I started using it. Different machines, built from different images, on different operating systems and hardware - Firefox aggressively consumes up to 1.4GB of memory on each, and then the application crashes. On reboot, it seems to use about 400MB less, but then creeps up as tabs are opened and closed.
Something within the made image is bad then. Check your antivirus or firewall for any plugins which attach to firefox, its probably that.
Well, after going through all the posts, I am surprised not only how fervent people are in saying, "THERE IS NO PROBLEM!" when there actually is a problem. I have to restart Firefox if I leave it open for too long. I've seen memory usage climb to 500K-800K when it gets very bad. When I close the program, sometimes it doesn't close properly. I have encountered the error Lastar84 mentioned:
"Also, none of them refuses to exit the way Firefox does - so that if I should restart it, I have the warning that a Firefox process is already running! (Yet another problem that Firefox needs to confess to and fix)."
I love firefox to death (Ad-Block), but I would like these issues fixed. Then the world will be perfect.
I agree how many years do we have to deal with these memory leaks? Im going to close my firefox now because I dont want to burn out my memory modules. My laptop actually overheats when Firefox is open for too long. Its pathetic already!
If you have set browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers to 1 And this issue still occurs, then the problem is nothing to do with Firefox at all. It is either a memory leak in an installed plugin or extension, Or an external application is loading a plugin into firefox which is disrupting the garbage collection.
AV's and Firewalls which make use of a virtual keyboard, typically have a virtual keyboard driver which DOES prevent firefox from releasing memory.
I can't say it any clearer, CHECK YOUR SYSTEMS.
I solved my problems completely by renaming the Mozilla virtual keyboard loader dll in the kaspersky folder.
Squall,
Help us all out by telling us the original name of the Mozilla virtual keyboard loader dll so we can try that.
Ken
Why, then, it is only Firefox that suffers from the "virtual keyboard problem"? I am running 24/7 (sleeping 5 hours every now and then) in two workstations and the ONLY piece of software affected by this mystical "virtual keyboard" driver. I have used three different AV's. I am NOT using ANY firewall apart from the Windows native one.
If, in your opinion, we have to tune our system because there is ONE SINGLE application that suffers from problems NO OTHER application does something is terribly wrong.
I think the way you have solved your problem has very little, if anything, to do with the problems most of us have. As for myself I have lost hope a long time ago.
not at all mkn, the problem lies squarely in the hands of the developers who made the virtual keyboard loader, The leak occurs because it disrupts the cleanup that occurs when a site is left, or a tab closed.
I think the problem you all have is a lack of knowing what you are doing on one part, and on another the use of applications that inject themselves into a running process for another part.
@Ken, The virtual keyboard plugin has various different names depending on the AV pack it comes with, usually its mozvkbd or mzvkbd3
I am a user of Mac OS X where neither the windows virtual keyboard driver nor AV plug-ins are employed yet the memory hogging does occur nonetheless. So while these may contribute to Firefox' memory leaks the occurrence of said leaks across different platforms at least indicate that there are additional problems with the memory management.
"The leak occurs because it disrupts the cleanup that occurs when a site is left, or a tab closed."
I think you are oversimplifying things. First of all the leak occurs in several operating systems (I have seen it in Linux as well and seen report from OSX). Secondly, it occurs even when the browser has been left alone. I have seen a case with a 2GB+ memory use in five days' time (NO extensions installed btw) loadied with a static site with just one single CLEAN (triple-checked) ajax routine fetching status information from an intranet address. The computer was my boss', left running alone when he had a business trip.
The simple fact that ANY other browser copes with all these situations without memory problems proves that there is SOMETHING badly wrong with the FF approach. Yes, we all can find explanations and external reasons but why on earth do we not experience them with other browsers. I am a developer and I use IE7, FF3, Safari 3 and 4 beta, Chrome and Opera every day (plux lynx/links, of course) so I think I have seen how things really are.
If the problem lies in the "virtual keyboard driver" I think the developers of FF should really try to figure out how this huge problem has been solved in the rest of the applications that it dows NOT affect.
I find it very, very rude to see somebody telling people to "check their systems" that are working perfecly in every other respect.
oversimplifying... not at all, im just not a novice user like most, i pay attention to what my computer is doing and why its doing it.
since the BFcache only chews memory via active browsing, then clearly something in the users system is preventing the Firefox cycle collector from freeing memory as its no longer required.
now disabling bfcache for me, saw firefox drop from 400MB's of usage to only about 250, depending on tab amounts.
Since firefox works fine in clean installs of mac, linux and windows (all of which i have been privy to test), And since in the case of Macs, the hardware doesn't really change It has to be something the user is installing which loads with the system.
It can be any program, a Keyboard/Mouse driver which has additional buttons or battery sensors. Webcam driver An older version of Flash, Java, Shockwave. In Vista it can even be a sound driver.
Sigh.
If this REALLY is the case, why on earth is this fabulous BFcache disabled by default? And - more importantly: why has it been written in such a manner? Why? I ask this question as a professional developer with more than 25 years of professional background.
I may be repeating myself but still and in capitals this time:
WHY IS FIREFOX THE ONLY PIECE OF SOFTWARE AFFECTED?
I cannot but wonder at your way of seeing the source and the scope of the problem let alone the possible solution(s).
Squall, mkn, Ken, and everyone else....
Please read my reply to the ongoing discussion as a post here:
http://neosmart.net/blog/2009/on-the-matter-of-firefox-and-memory-leaks/
It was originally intended as a reply to this thread, but it was too long for the comments.
If this original post was the rant about Firefox's memory usage then this is my "objective" take on the matter.
I read Squall's recent post about the browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers setting and decided to do a little experiment. I'm running version 3.1 beta 3 so my results (and mileage) may vary from yours. On my XP Media Center HP dv5000 with 2G RAM, I have been seeing as much as 1.2G of memory being consumed by FF.
My experiment was to alternate the browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers between -1 (which was my default for some reason) and 1 as suggested by Squall. I ran two FF windows with a total 31 tabs open between the two windows. Only three add-on were enabled: CoolPreviews 2.7.2, Google Toolbar for Firefox 3.1.20081127W, and RealPlayer Browser Record Plugin 1.0. I have another of other add-ons but these are the only ones compatible with the beta browser.
I toggled the setting for browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers and after each toggle ended FF by termininating the process through Windows Task Manager. I allowed all tabs to open and stabilze performed a few routine tasks in each tab. Some of the tabs had ActiveX and/or java controls active. The same tabs were loaded each time so with the exception of changed page content (which may or may not have been trivial) the environment was the same.
I then let the windows stay open for at least five minutes and recorded the Mem Usage as shown in Task Manager. Here are the results (mem values in M):
browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers value Initial 1 -1 809 402 428 398 421 437 406 401 419 390 442
I then changed browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers to 1 and let the browser run undisturbed for over an hour. Peak Mem Usage was 516M. Changed the setting back to a -1, let it set for an hour and the reading was 622M. Switched back to a 1 and left it for nearly 4 hours with what would be my normal usage. That reading waS 517M.
Conclusion: The browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers setting of 1 seemed to have a pronounced though small effect in the memory required by FF. Anecdotally, it seemed that the browser loaded faster and was more stable but because I'm running a beta version I can't categorically state that it's solely the result of the setting.
I will watch and see if, in normal usage, I have the same long term "creep" in memory as I have observed in the past and will post after a couple of days.
mkn,
Firefox is built nearly entirely with scripting. as such, it is subject to be influenced negatively in many circumstances where the cycle collector fails.
At two points in time i was seeing usage of over 1GB, The first was caused by opening multiple flash applets (namely poorly made flash) and the second was at caused by the installation of KIS2009, in which renaming mzvkbd3.dll and mzvkbd.dll and reloading Firefox fixed completely.
It could be of benefit to start in safe mode(w/networking) and see if the same usage is seen.
If not, you should then go back to normal mode, and use Process Explorer to find out exactly what files are being loaded by the Fx process, thats initially how i found the mzvkbd3 file to be the cause of my issues.
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers
when alot of tabs are openened and closed it really makes a difference.
Another source of Firefox slowdowns is sqlite fragmentation, especially where the places file is over 50MB >.<
mkn, read that link i posted, bfcache is set to automatic, based on the installed memory.
I think this guy is an Internet Explorer Fanboy and is trying to find a way to say Internet Explorer is better than Firefox. Because I also don't see how this guy got the memory usage on Firefox unless he used Firefox 2.0 instead or loaded up on add-ons that are known to cause high amounts of memory consumption.
I did a little test of my own using Firefox 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 3.0, 3.5 and Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 8.
What I found was Internet Explorer 8 did worse on the acid3 test then Firefox 1.0.
What does this mean? It means Internet Explorer 8 (released March 19th 2009) has older technology then even Firefox 1.0 (release Nov 9th 2004) when it comes to web standards. I think that says it all. Internet Explorer 8's technology is at least 4 1/2 years behind Firefox.
Well, that's of absolutely no help whatsoever. There are people here who are fans of Firefox and would just like to get it fixed. It hogs masses of memory and fails to give it back to the system. It's nothing to do with Internet Explorer, 3rd party add-ins, external scripts or any other crap like that. FF without add-ins or any modification hogs memory once you start using multiple tabs and sites that are "content-rich" (mafia wars on myspace as an example). It really is that simple.
People that have the problem are still using FF, despite the memory leak, and can do without the waters being muddied by those who get their rocks off worrying about which browser is the bestest one in the whole wide world. Cuz those rose-tinted glasses are spoiling the view.
myspace's buggy coding and bloat is the issue there.
MattLee, that's exactly the sort of extremely unhelpful "Firefox is God" sort of behavior that helps no one - least of all, Firefox and its users.
Ah Ok then so. And Myspace somehow manages to keep control of FF after navigating away, using it's grip on the browser to make FF retain all that lovely RAM and not give it back to the system. That's nearly as clever as a really clever thing, isn't it? Well done you for spotting it!!
Simple rule of thumb that I go by for eliminating nonsense comments:
If anyone offers a negative point of view about a product and they're subsequently accused of being a fanboy for the other side, or a troll - it's usually an indication that the accuser is a fanboy or troll. From that point on you can skip over any other comments by the same author. It really helps clear the clutter. (You know who you are!)
The facts based on tons and tons of complaints:
Firefox is unacceptably hoggish on many, perhaps most systems. It's often sluggish to start, and occasionally refuses to shut down, leaving the processes running. This appears to be true if even if you have no addons, and is likely made worse by poorly written addons. This problem is also exacerbated by certain hardware and/or software configurations that may be on your system.
Firefox developers cannot possibly be ignorant about these issues. They have apparently decided that this is a suitable compromise based on ratio of satisfied to dissatisfied users, and they must assume that most people don't notice because they have fairly fast systems with sufficient RAM. Lots of software programming out there is shoddy and poorly written when it comes to leanness and efficiency, because the developers are either not skilled enough to write it properly, or they're lazy. I generally like Firefox, but I think it's dumb for the developers to settle on its current level of performance. If they're not working to fix it, then they're fools and they'll eventually lose the marketing share that they've managed to claw away from the garbage of all software, I.E.
I work all day long (and too many nights) on graphic arts and web development, between a dozen Macs and PCs. The issues with Firefox run across all of the various computers that I deal with, some more than others. In fact, if I want to get to the web fast, I usually click Safari or Opera, neither of which offer as much as Firefox, unfortunately.
the sluggish start is actually a fault in the sqlite system, it doesn't clean up after itself and the sqlite files end up as big as 100MB's or more,
I see speed improvements of more then 40% when i compact the sqlite files (data isn't removed from the sqlite files when deleted or cleared, its overritten with useless data, which leads to the large sizes and slow profile loading)
I'm using the latest 3 branch of Firefox beta now. The memory usage is still high. With a few add-ons & 8 tabs open it's taking up around 196 Mb now. Surprise, with a similar setup IE 8 takes up only 39 MB, hoo!
comparing a standalone browser to a browser thats integrated into windows. most of the DLL's are preloaded via explorer.exe and various other applications.
Not the wisest idea.
Same thing (i'm pissed!), sorry but most people are not geeks , hackers and don't give a damn about benchmarking and optimizing stuff.. i just want a browser that don't stress me more them my work does!
You're not supposed to work for the machine!!! the machine should work for you!
"...comparing a standalone browser to a browser thats integrated into windows. most of the DLL's are preloaded via explorer.exe and various other applications.
Not the wisest idea."
On the other hand, if Windows (or OS X) is the turf where Mozilla wants to play, then the Firefox team needs to get their act together and create a tight piece of software that surpasses the performance IE or Safari -- even on the home team's turf. That's the nature of the biz, and if they don't do a better job, I predict that very soon Firefox will begin to lose market share.
Now that, Lonny, that i can agree with.
They MUST get the sqlite cleanup function working in the browser, as allowing the file to balloon to massive sizes is also a cause of launch and browsing slowness.
You forgot to mention if you are using addons or if you were not Addons take huge memory especially if you use more than 1 The problem may be user oriented rather than Firefox's side
Re: http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/firefox-3-is-still-a-memory-hog/#comment-385291
I second that Mahmoud. I'm surprised that a lot of folks who consider themselves to be logical and intelligent are writing off your post as if you made the whole thing up simply because their un-scientific tests did not yield the same results. Wouldn't an object/analytic approach be to look at all the variables and form and test hypotheses? When you have a disparity of results in a test you can't just pick the result you "like" or "prefer". You form new tests.
I found this article trying to fix what I thought was a memory leak in FireFox. A co-worker on my development team is seeing ballooning in memory usage by FireFox but I'm not seeing as much as he. Comparisons to IE are meaningless for the same reason previously stated: IE is integrated into the OS and so memory that FF is having to allocate for itself, in the case of IE, is allocated to the system. So basically, IE's numbers are misleading.
It is a well known fact that FF uses a lot of memory. I don't mean this as a criticism - I love FF. But, denying that there is a problem, in light of the tons of posts on the WWW confirming it, is either illogical or just plain childish.
nah, it just seperates the levels of Tech experience from user to user.
I currently have about 54tabs open, and running on 344MB.
my tweaks worked for me, and i have over 30 extensions installed.
@Squall "nah, it just seperates the levels of Tech experience from user to user."
much like what happens on linux?
I agree with others that once chrome gets the addon support firefox is finished. Mozilla is playing around with personas and new tab features when they should iron out the sluggish feel of firefox. Shoddy programming? What about the fact the vanilla firefox opens a new tab at the end instead of next to the current tab like it logically should? All other browsers do this accept firefox.
I removed the Skype add-on and some other bug detection add-on and cleared my cache, download history, off-line data and cookies. I kept me browsing history and my saved passwords then restarted firefox and now its running at 130MB and jumps between 3, 5 and 11% CPU usage. I advise you try the same and report back. I think that its all of the crap I had in my Private Data that was making FF chug along. Give it a shot.
Real Player addon was the problem on my machine.
Hey all...
Almost time for FF3.1, but I think I have to say that I am having the same problem on my machine with 2GB RAM with FF3. I have tested firefox on openSuSE and XP (and a fresh reinstall of XP), and I have found that my firefox with about 5add-ons, starts at around 70mb, and after being open for about half-an-hour, it reaches 160mb! This is the case with 2 html tabs open!
Also, at times, it starts to eat memory HUGELY, sooo big that the CPU %usage goes as high as 50% (one of my cores!).
Funnily, this happens on both XP and Linux!!!
Any ideas? I am a huge fan of FF3, so do not want to lose it!
Thanks Mo
160MB is fine for a profile with browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers at default
FF 3.0.8 As mentioned in a posting above, removed the skype plugin and saw memory footprint go from 1.1Gb (yes Gb!) to 97Mb.
Most grateful for the tip.
I just restarted firfox because it was using 3.3 GiB of memory. (yes that's a G) The only plugin I have is the google toolbar. And I had it running for about two days. I used to use Google chrome on XP for this reason. I wish Opera didn't suck. Maybe I'll try Epiphany.
Firefox is a memory hog, pure and simple, I've switched to Google Chrome and when I have compatibility issues I simply use IE.
Problem solved.
RE: http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/firefox-3-is-still-a-memory-hog/#comment-392548
Scott the reason people are writing off Mahmoud is because they love FireFox so much they will argue that it is so wonderful and great no matter what anyone says. FIREFOX SUCKS! I haven't even had it a whole day and I hate it already. It's slow compared to IE and sucks up memory and bogs down the whole internet. I don't really understand what is so great about that? I even have the pop-up blocker on and it doesn't block half the stuff that IE's popup blocker does. What is great about that? The only reason I got FF was because there is a site I wanted to check out but it won't let you download files unless you have FireFox which is a really gay way to make people get something they don't want. I notice when you bitch at site admin's about this sort of thing they just say "Oh well Internet Explorer doesn't follow web standards that's why we don't support it." To me that is just another way of saying "We're too fuckin lazy and stupid to code a website to be compatible with IE." I mean, it's not hard at all to code a fucking page to work in IE, but to purposely make shit not work just because you are using IE and not FF is bullshit. But ya know, kids nowadays love total crap, so it's no surprise they love FireFox.
Memory hog issue: Regardless of the max level of memory reached by Firefox after a session has been going on for a while, why is it that closing all but one window and closing all but one tab in that window, and going to the Google home page does not result in reducing the memory used? The only way I can reduce it is to close firefox altogether.
I've had the same troubles. Just had to kill Firefox because it was using 78% of my 1GB of RAM. I watch it all the time (running Ubuntu) and it is always leaking memory until I have to restart it -- usually when it gets up around 500MB. Sites with video especially seem to spike memory usage.
I see that I neglected to say I am running on an older Dell with 750MB memory, using XP professional SP2.
I download a lot of photos, but even more, I am on cnn.com and nytimes.com which have a lot of ads. and use My Yahoo as a news reader and open up some 10-15 tabs from these to read one at a time. At the end of this sort of session, I will close all but one tab, set that one to google.com (just about the least busy page on the web) and the memory NEVER reduces itself. Only when I close ALL the tabs and restart FFox do I clean up the usage.
My firefox runs at 500 MB. It's ridiculous. It has reached 800 MB before.
Opera can open up so many tabs, install other plugins and etc..but the memory usage is just in an acceptable range... In Firefox case that I encountered and still having problem with it..that it's really quite shocking the memory usage can go up as much as 2GB..and hogging the whole operating system... Mozilla still not fixing this issue and Firefox 3 is just all the same story repeating itself...
FF has been, is and always will be CPU and resource hungry shite. Pardon to be that blatant, but it is the fact Only f**g browser to crash and bring a 2Ghz 2Gb RAM machine to its knees.
Thanks for the blog, it was good and necessary to discuss real issues that some, if not a lot of people, have been and are still experiencing with a 'simple' web browser across multiple platforms. If people can't discuss issues without others bashing and inciting hate, there's a larger problem than with browsers. I really like Firefox and Seamonkey, but find it frustrating that the same issues I've experienced over the last couple of years remain to be issues, that memory management and resource capping haven't become a better part of the code, especially with the onslaught of media sources available to websurfers and devs. Be nice if a Mozilla developer could magically appear at one's household or workplace when the issues arise, and see the system crawl occur and gather intel to really pinpoint the source(s) and that work its way into the point release. (Please, no Moz devs magically appear at my work or household, safety warning issued).
I've been testing Firefox 3.5 Beta 4 for a couple of days with a fresh profile and so far memory management seems to have improved considerably. The browser now uses about 110-120 MB RAM on my machine and one can see that memory is released when tabs are closed. This might also be attributed to the lack of extensions since half of the ones I regurarely use are not available yet. But given the fact that I use the bare minimum of extensions on 3.0 (Adblock Plus, Gears, Xmarks, Secure Login, GMail/GReader watcher) I doubt that they cause the leaks but arguably this would warrant further investigation.
Which brings me to another point: Extensions and plug-ins are a reality and especially the usage of the former is actively encouraged by Firefox. Despite that, Firefox has no means that allows the user to measure CPU usage and memory consumption of individual extensions. The only way to find a misbehaving extension is through trial and error. AFAIK Google Chrome plans to enable monitoring CPU/memory usage for individual extensions similar to what they already have in place for tabs.
FF 3.0.1.0 certainly does have a memory leak as far as I'm concerned. I restarted it about 15 minutes ago, minimal add-ons, with only this window open, and it is past 135k in memory and climbing (it started out under 60k, if memory serves, haha). I finally got sick of my computer fan running and went looking for a source, and I found it in this browser. Leave it for any length of time and it pushes 1 gb every time. I love the browser, but it's a bit much.
I run Firefox on numerous hardware and software platforms and although I have seen improvements in recent releases, Firefox still uses way more memory than it ought to. I am typing this in Firefox on Windows 7 with 3GB RAM and it sucks up 300-400MB RAM with less than 3 tabs open. This is just one example, but it is a memory hog, and it's not platform specific or add-on specific either. Websites seem to have no relevance in my case either, it just takes up that much memory.
Is there anyone out there who know how to manipulate or tweak/hack FF3 system files to further improve the memory usage. Using some XP like pagefile options to only use harddisk space to store the huge caches that FF3 uses.
James is right tho, this memory issue are not caused by installing extensions or plugins or even just merely browsing the internet.
If Opera browser can sort the memory usage efficiently and why can't Firefox. One of the biggest improvement yet accomplished by Opera compared to other internet browsers.
Maybe I should just stop complaining and use Opera already.
But the coolest thing about Firefox that any other internet browsers doesn't have are the plugins extensions especially the Firebug add-on.
My places.sqlite is 188mb ,what can i do to make it smaller. My only problem is hang at exit it goes from 100mb to 480mb and I must allways end firefox in Task Manager. I disabled allmost all of my add ons (using only BB code and google toolbar) and disabled java
Nice! I just deleted FF 188 megs places.sqlite file and it was all OK. I back it up but really dont need it.All bookmarks and stuff is saved ..too bad I did not do that earlier.
I have my Ubuntu Firefox up to 1.3GB of ram. It sucks because I don't want to have to restart firefox and then reposition all my windows over the multiple desktops I am running.
I have to restart Firefox at least once every few hours to keep memory usage below 1 gig of memory. Once it gets above that it starts freezing every few seconds, though the other programs on my system will keep working. This is generally with about 20-30 tabs open and 3 extensions, though closing tabs has NO effect. This happens on both my home and work computers, though less at work.
You have to look at what plugins / addons you have installed. I was running at 228Mb Then I removed the .NET "assistant" I also removed IE tab (since IE8 now allows IE7 view + M$ SuperPreview allows preview back to IE6) And finally I removed EditCss since I have FireFox. Now I'm at 55Mb
if you all think 300MB is a lot take a look at this pic http://host1.ncservices.ro/ffmem.jpg I only had a few plugins. Since this last version FF keeps crushing on me and it`s really annoying.
Plug Ins: - Adobe Acrobat - Microsoft DRM x2 - Mozilla Default Plug in - Shockwave Flash - Shockwave for Director - Windows Media Player Plug-in Dynamic Link Library
AddOns:
BB Code Google toolbar
FF is at 184mb with 4 tabs open- This is normal i Think.
Im writing coz I wonder if i can disable more plug ins
Can I disable any of this plug ins without having a problem?
Just going to chime in to say a few things, I doubt I'll be back. This thread is a bit lengthy as it is.
one) My firefox does the same thing as Mahmoud
two) I also see this on multiple systems.
three) Strangely I have vs 2008 running in most cases. ( also happens when not running, but its worse when vs 2008 is running )
four) Ending ff3 is part of my daily routine.
I love FF, its all I use, but I too wish they would take a Que and fix the memory issues. Its been apparent since I started using it pre 2.x. All of my friends says the same thing, "Yeah its a memory hog, but I love it ;)... So if its not a memory hog for you, then quit defending the fact its a non issue, it is for some of us..
yeah, you're right. It is a memory hog issue. And we still love FF... but this an issue need fixing. Don't wait till someone come up with a much better browser and Mozilla start to pay attention when people are moving away from FF. Don't let that happens and FF still the coolest and IE not even close.
OK, I'm going to post up here again, as some of the recent posts are extremely aggravating.
I posted back on the 13th of May and stated that I ran numerous versions of Firefox on numerous platforms. What aggravates me is those who post up saying "I have no problems, FFox has 46 tabs open and 100-something megabytes of memory use and...[blah, blah, blah, blah]".
Please, take Ulao's advice; if it doesn't give you issues, consider yourself a needle in a haystack and maybe somewhat lucky. Although I think those of us who are dealing with this issue are that much smarter off because of it.
I continue to update and upgrade an am again typing this on Windows 7 (one of 3 machines I run Windows 7 on and one of many more running other OSes and software configurations) and I continue to have to restart Firefox on a daily basis on all of them - it's just that unstable. Sure it's quick, sure it's easily customizable, sure I almost like it more than IE8 on Windows 7 (which by the way runs almost flawlessly), but it still has a huge resource footprint that is completely uncalled for in a program designed for browsing the internet.
Mozilla, I hope you guys are reading this and banging your heads up against the wall and losing sleep trying to figure this out!! That's all I have to say, and hopefully someone else who is "all fine and dandy" with Firefox doesn't insult us with their "happy, no-problem" story. :-)
Had the issue
Fixed the issue.
Its either a rogue plugin, extension or in memory DLL which hooks firefox, that causes it to hold onto memory.
Though i wonder how many of you are using tools like nosquint, as i've noticed using that my firefox memory usage is double what it normally is when most tabs are set to 120%
I have used FF since it came out and I always end up w this issue in every version so far. I end up trying other browsers every time. Currently its FF3 it did run good for quite awhile now its at a crawl and hogging all my resources again. Someone recommended Google Chrome are there any others I should look at?
LMAO well nice to know some of you are fortunate to have no issues with FF3 LOL! i run multiple systems and a few servers some custom built, some not so custom, Laptops desktops and 3 rackmounts, i have a 2GB DDR all the way up to DDR2 slowest CPU i have is 2.4Ghz rackmounts are Dual CPU's some systems AMD some Intel, regardless. when i uses FF2 my mem usuage was around 64% 84% max about 100% thats with over 15 new tabs open and about 3 new windows with a few more open. as soon as the FF3 update. my mem usage shot up to 300MB for not even 6 tabs and onley one window regardless of the sites even blank google on each tab does it. this is with WinXP SP2, Win XP SP3 WMCE 2003, WMCE 2005, Vista Ultiamte 64, and 32. FF3 needs alot of work in the resource hog dept,
I say again - you guys have got to look at what plugins you have installed. Is anything unnecessary running? Also a new plugin was just released called "Page Speed" It ties in to Firebug plugin for Firefox. Try running that site and see if the sites you're visiting have memory leaks.
Is there other ways to reduce the memory usage without re-installing? I've checked out the URLs given in this site and across the Intenet. Apparently, some of them aren't working.
Found this doing a search for "firefox memory hog" also. The only reason I use Firefox anymore, is fore Firebug and theme development. For general web browsing I've gone back to Safari or Chrome, and sometimes Opera just for fun.
Firefox has always been this way for me, and I've always just guessed it was Firebug, Adblock, or some other plugin doing it. When I got my new Vista64 powered laptop and installed Firefox and opened it up with no plugins installed, I opened a few tabs and started downloading the free apps I use. A few hours later I'm at 700mb of resources for no reason at all on a vanilla install of Firefox 3.
I mean, 700mb? For a web browser? For real? Thankfully memory is cheap, but I'm not spending $100/$200 on a ram upgrade just to use Firefox. Haha!
I downloaded the new update today: 3.0.11, and, while I can't say whether the overall problems are solved, at least now, when I leave an application and return to my homepage (google.com) memory is DEFINITELY freed up!! That is progress!!!
I did not read all the responses but I did do a search for java in the above posts. I use my laptop 24/7, with cold boot about every 2.5 days or so, with extensive online usage. I only experience the memory leak occasionally. I run noscript and am particular about what pages have control of my machine. My wife is a facebook/myspace user. My personal experience has shown that every time FF3 slows down to a crawl, (once a week or so,) after hours of usage with dozens of tabs, it has been related to java still running in the background, after some offending page has been closed. The java icon is shown in the taskbar and I've never found a way to close it without closing FF. The memory just climbs at 4K increments until FF is closed and restarted with memory usage as high as 700+ meg on a 1gig system. After that everything is fine. Here's my position: I want to know, is this a FF issue or a java issue and why?
I am not well versed in the complexities of Firefox memory management. All I know is that it consistently requires 350 megabytes of memory on my laptop. It crawls after about 5 minutes of usage (on AC). It crashes on average 4 to 5 times per session. I have very few extensions and add-ons installed. (Had to take them all off). I rarely have more than 5 tabs open at once. I haven't counted how many are open per session. Firefox used to be a reliable and stable platform but at this point I am ready to give IE7 another look. Hell it can't hurt compared to what I'm working with on Firefox.
I came across this article looking for reasons why FF3 was such a memory hog. I an on a MacBook Pro with 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo with 2GB of ram. FF3 Sucks up my memory! I will periodically just have GMAIL open, and I'll watch it with Activity Monitor, and it will be running at 25, 30, 45, 60% of my systems memory. Even with just one tab open on Google's home page, it coasts at 25 - 28%. Compare that to Safari, which coasts at around 4 - 12%. Camino is roughly the same, but is more stable. The only problem is, it's not as up to date as FF or Safari. I find that Safari has LOTS of issues.
So, I've switched back to FF2 and installed FireBug. All I can say is WOW. It coasts at around 4 - 8%. I haven't noticed any memory abuses or leaks, and I use it pretty much all day. Don't know what it is, but FF2 is far superior to 3, Safari, Camino (Sorry), and all of the other's I've tried using.
I'm not gonna go back to FF3 unless they really, really fix these memory issues. The only thing more abusive than that is Photoshop :-)
TX I will try FF2 then and write down if everythings ok or not
I m using now FF 2 and it uses less memory, but I dod not know that my FF 3 will uninstall when FF2 was installed so I lost all of my passwords
Ok I went back to FF3 and my passwods apeare again -nice, I do not know why FF2 uses less memory than FF3 ,ok true FF2 is a litle bit slower but anyway
Yup. I have the same problem. I was just surifing a site of lists and images. Nothing script-y. I had about 10 windows open, and I just clocked firefox at 780 megs of memory...
It seems as some FF3 users have more going on than they are able to recognize. If your memory usage is over 100k after FF is first launched, I would question your themes and extensions. I run 10 extensions including noscript, tab mixed plus, foxmarks, and toolbar buttons and the Littlefox theme on a 1.8 Thinkpad w/1g of ram. BTW, a clean launch with only one tab open only consumes 53k of ram.
After 3 days of running, including sitting idle for one day FF, is only consuming 144k of ram. During this period, I have had multiple FF sessions open, each with at least 4-12 tabs. I have just watched my task manager for over 4hrs while surfing and memory only climbed to 146K.
This is now the next day after my wife used the laptop visiting her sites during the evening and I have 414k memory consumed. As I suspected, java is running and all her pages and tabs have long been closed. I also noticed that the page faults were only at 56000 yesterday with ram consumption at 144k. Today it is at 5,000,000 plus with ram consumption at 414k. I ask my original question, is this a FF issue or java and why?
I wish my Firefox only used 414K memory!! I would recommend, dhugens, that you not question those of us who are having issues - especially me. I have an extensive background in all things electronics, especially computers, and I can assure you my issues are not due to "ignorance" of a "awry" piece of software or a specific add-on. Firefox is a memory hog, plain and simple; if you don't have issues with it, don't waste your time explaining your situation, it isn't likely to help those of us who do. H.A.N.D.!! ;-)
rotflmao.
I heard the same shit from some guy the other week when fixing his computer that he managed to right royally fuck up.
FACT : Someone always knows more then you... some people even know more then you about everything.
Anyhow, Firefox on my 24" screen is sucking up memory lately, and i think its because i use nosquint.
either that or its one of the task manager extenders i installed.
I keep Firefox open for days, even weeks, with up to 40-50 tabs open all at once between 2 windows sometimes, and it never goes above 200 MB unless there are memory leaks.
Well, aozf05, seeing as memory leaks is what this article is all about, that's not saying too much :)
There seem to be people that idolize Firefox the same way they satanize other software. I like FF very much but I just finished a session because it was taking 500+ MB of ram, way too much for my PC. Seriously thinking of other options. Sorry, Firefox fanatics.
I have the same problem. It goes up over time of keeping the browser open. Here is my case:
PS: I have 74 different Add-ons installed. I noticed the memory leak begins to get TERRIBLY bad after I installed more Add-ons. Originally, I have about 60 Add-ons, and the memory usage is hovering from 100Mb to 350Mb, but it is bearable as I have a pretty powerful computer.
Yesterday, when I had 5 Windows opened and 100 plus tabs opened and working with the browser for 8 hours non-stop, the memory usage went all the way to over 1GB. That was the time my FF3 browser could not take it anymore and started to crawl. I had to close the browser. But after closing the browser, I still have to kill the process as it is still running in the background.
So, I conclude that FF3 browser memory usage and leak could possibly be due to a few factors. They are: 1) Some Add-ons are not programmed properly and cause FF3 to leak memory. 2) Some Add-ons cannot close properly even after FF3 is exited and we have to kill FF3 through the task manager. 3) It has nothing to do with the websites I visit.
Can someone tell me how to find out the chronological order of which Add-ons are installed recently? FF3 has no such feature, and I cannot remember which was the few latest Add-ons I had installed.
My thinking to nail-down the problem of memory leakage is to disable Add-ons and see how FF3 performs, but surely I do not expect myself to disable all Add-ons. That would tamper my browsing experience and I hate to go that route. But I may just have to if I have no choice.
Although I love FF, the memory hogging issues force me to use IE8 and Chrome as browser supplements. If I had it my way, I'd regularly have around 100 tabs open, but in order to reduce the need to restart firefox every hour, I keep it under 30. Without any pages loading java, my memory usage hits about 650mb+ after 5 hours of surfing. Neither closing tabs nor clearing my cache helps (seriously... still 650mb and rising for 3 tabs after closing 20 of them? wtf?). I have about 5 extensions, and they include the likes of the popular Fire Gestures and Adblock. I doubt any of them are the culprits. New features are nice, but using less memory is better.
After posting a couple of times, and following the discussion, I realize several things: I am WAY behind the pack in terms of open tabs and windows, and on installed plug-ins! And... I would not mind FF hogging memory if it would just give it back when I close a bunch of tabs or windows. It is the need to shut it down completely that I find so galling!
Lu
You have so many add.ons ,thats not bad at all.
I have onl BB Code and Google toolbar and and only 5 plugins On and Im on 316mb
Thats bad!
Dig,
You will notice that my CPU usage is only 18% but my memory usage is 670,476Kb
and for this time round, I started with 225Mb at the start of firing my FF3 browser, with 1 Window
and 35 tabs. I closed my 35 tabs and open 1 Window with 8 tabs.
But it continues to climb up over time.
I do not wish to assume anything. Whether it is FF3 or the Addons, I really don't know. What I like
to find out is if anyone of you know of an Addon that can monitor the memory usage of each individual
Addon. I know Chrome has the ability of monitoring each tab's memory usage but in my case, I really
doubt it is the urls that is giving problem. My experience shows me that FF3 does hog memory and not
release it back after tabs are closed and at the same time, some of the Addons that I installed lately had
cause my FF3 to leak memory. So, I really would like to have a tool or Addon to tell me which Addon is
the culprit. Sigh!
i have 120+ tabs open using 807MB.
i consider that justified memory usage.
Check your systems, as has been said countless times. these memory leaks are not in firefox, but modules loaded by firefox, or sites.
Here is the link to my processes and memory usage.
http://my.jetscreenshot.com/556/20090625-2ewk-69kb.jpg
with the crap you have running im surprised windows hasn't told you to gtfo.
I can afford it. My Windows enjoys it. Bill Gates would be proud of me, not that I give a damn, just as I don't give a damn about how you stick your finger up your own nose after sticking it up your down there.
right, just don't complain about how much memory an app uses when you have shit like that loading modules into every process which would causes leaks and issues.
I'm currently running FF3.5RC and it seems to be somewhat more stable. I recently left my HP DV5221, XP SP3 running untouched for more than 5 days. Six windows with 43 open tabs with at least one streaming java content real time stock quotes) and other pages with miscellaneous java scripts running. I have 9 active add-ons to include AdBlock plus. On my 2GB system. FF3.5RC maxed out at about 530M. With 3.0 and the other beta releases I was as high as 1.2G.
Interestingly enough, an IE7 instance with one static tab was sitting over 500M as well when I sat down at the keyboard. It had been open the same amount of time, but it's mem usage has dropped back down to 47M as I write this.
Ken
Squall, stop being a jerk. I hv my prerogative, and you are the one complaining, not me.
I'm not being a jerk, im stating facts as they are.
you're running additional programs which most likely have moduless that snap into running processes, and its these which cause programs to leak memory.
Firefox 3.5 does not leak memory by itself. it requires loaded modules or badly coded sites to do that.
Does any serious internet user has only 1 tab opened and behave like a nasty snotty badger called Squall?
[quote]
i have 120+ tabs open using 807MB.
i consider that justified memory usage.
Check your systems, as has been said countless times. these memory leaks are not in firefox, but modules loaded by firefox, or sites. [/quote]
You're getting emotional unnecessarily, and are also failing to have previous posts by me.
For example? Stop being presumptious about what I have on my computer. Anyway, I am on version 3.0.11
If you accuse me of installing and running broken scripts, then is it my fault? All those Addons are most likely the problem, but then, if they are a problem, why Mozila or FF never ban them? Is it because FF is open source and free?
Just hopping in. I think Squall is referring more to the likes of things like anti-virus or other software also. Sometimes they hook into apps or monitor process and cause them to have issues. Squall isn't "accusing" you of anything, don't get so upset. He's trying to help.
"For example? Stop being presumptious about what I have on my computer. Anyway, I am on version 3.0.11"
I saw your task list, and i saw the myriad of crap you have running in the background
"If you accuse me of installing and running broken scripts, then is it my fault? All those Addons are most likely the problem, but then, if they are a problem, why Mozila or FF never ban them? Is it because FF is open source and free?"
YES it is your fault. you are the computer user, not mozilla, you are the one installing these addon's, and install applications that run in the background causing potential havoc by loading faulty DLL files which cause FF to chew on memory.
Mozilla should not take the blame for you installing extensions into an extendible browser, the same way Microsoft would not take the blame for you installing crapware like Spyware guard 2009.
Mozilla addon's at times conflict with each other, where there are no problems with an extension on its own, there may be with a combination of extensions.
...this is like blaming nvidia for their drivers crashing when you have faulty system ram.
Exactly Dillon.
Kaspersky Antivirus and Internet Security 2009, for example make use of a virtual keyboard module which plugin to the firefox.exe process.
I have proven across multiple computers that the Dll that hooks the virtual keyboard into mozilla firefox 3, actually causes the firefox garbage collector to break.
I was seeing firefox chewing upwards of 2GB's of memory+pagefile while only having 20 or so tabs open. closing them only released about 20% of that.
once however, i realised where the leak was occuring namely
http://www.file.net/process/mzvkbd3.dll.html
renaming this file and reloading firefox, the memory usage drops accordingly to what each tab was using (i also set browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers;1)
I have recently noticed that firefox is using more memory on my computer, but never to the extent of GB's of usage, i believe it to be caused by using a custom DPI and having both a larger screen at 1920x1200 (which requires more memory to show the window) and also that i use nosquint to zoom most tabs to 120%.
though it might also be caused by something i've installed that loads a DLL into all processes (like Prio).
All his comments are useless to me for I don't know what he is saying. It is like saying buy a house but don't put stuff in it, don't stay in it and most ridiculous his comments meant is that the house owner needs to tip-toe in his own home.
Unless he is saying I am installing crap, then he should tell me what are crap. Anti-virus, I am using Avast? Is it crap?
What else?
It is not the responsibility of a user to figure out what is crap or what is not crap. If FF builds its browser like a tank, then nothing will be considered crap cos nothing can penetrate its armor.
Same as Windows. Now, if someone opens his doors and windows and then go to sleep, does that mean he is responsible for a thief breaking into the house? Such logic does not gel with me.
Calm down you two. Arguing will not get us anywhere. Lu, try to look for solutions. It will be much helpful to others. Just think, thousands of FF users still having the same issues. You're not the only one.
@ Squall Leonhart... you mention closing tabs and having memory usage drop by 20%....I have not been able to see that sort of behavior: even when closing all tabs but one and displaying the google.com page ( almost empty) I do not get any significant reduction in memory.
I searched for the mzvkbd3.dll and it is not on my system. I do not have any strange plugins, and usually run only 3-5 windows with 5-10 tabs at most on ea.
Noted. I am here to find a solution. Not to be told that there is actually no problem in the first place. Worse, that I have crap installed on my computer and then leave me to figure out what is crap and what is not. Am I to know what is crap and what is not crap? If I know, I will be writing my own browser. Agree?
I have asked a few times. If someone can point me to a tool that can show me the memory usage of each Addons, much like what the task manager does, then I can know which is the rogue Addons and get rid of it. Then I can say these rogue Addons are crap.
Last count, I have 70+ Addons installed. I am still looking for more, because I enjoy most of them. I actually cannot live without some of these Addons. That is also the reason I am hesitant to upgrade to 3.5 just yet. Of late, my Session Manager is slow in responding. my own fault again? Anyway, those who cannot provide a solution, don't criticize others.
First off would be grabbing Process Explorer and setting the bottom pane to display DLL's.
Find how many of them loaded into Firefox aren't made by microsoft and list them.
Lu, simply listing the plugins can be of help, as then i can track discussions and test myself.
That's a good start. Shake hands and start brainstorming guys. Someone did mention to me if all things fail, downgrade to FF2.
No, Firefox 3 is an improvement over 2 in terms of memory usage.
That's is so true... but it can get you thinking if FF3 is the improvement over FF2, why is it the memory usage become the main issue here... People been asking for a solution at Mozilla and tons of support threads has been posted regarding this matter. Up until now, none of them where answered by the maker of Firefox. Really wish there is some commenter here who can come up with a better solution. We can't just sit and wait for Mozilla. Firefox is a free software, so let's hack it to make it better.
I thought I was crazy, so I did a search. Not more than five minutes ago I was using like 960MB with a single firefox session with 7 tabs open. It's just insane!
welcome to the club Mike... Ever reached 2gb of memory usage? I did when I left it running for 3 hours and slowing down Windows XP
I've never got that far, but it is just crazy to have only 7 tabs running and using that much ram being used. I usually fire up chrome for things like webmail and stuff, so I dont have to log back into things from rebooting FF. I still use FF heavily because of firebug and yslow, stuff like that.
Luckily im running an i7, 12GB RAM and a VeliciRaptor drive :-) So I don't notice the slow downs right away. However on my dual xeon workstation, it's way more noticeable much faster.
I have never had a crash with firefox.... until this last upgrade. Now if I leave it running for more than an hour I have to type a sentence and then wait for 10 seconds for the text to appear. 30 minutes more, and I get total lockup.
Memory usage is off the charts - and my system is a fresh install with 4 gigs of ram. How this version made it out as 'stable' is beyond me.
I am being forced to use opera until they release a solid version.
Firefox 3.5 is out now. Get it and see if any further improvement on memory usage.
I've been using 3.5 for a couple of weeks now. It does appear to be more stable and much less of a "hog" than earlier FF3 releases. Right now I'm running with 4 windows open comprising 45 tabs, a number of which are either running active X or java script. I don't use a lot of add-ons: AdBlocker Plus, CoolPreviews, ForecastFox, Google Toolbar, Move Media Player, Real Player Browser Recorder Plug-in, Status Bar Ex, UPromise TurboSaver, and UrlBarExt. As I write this I'm sitting at 682M on a 2G windows XP laptop. That usage has been pretty stable for the last 4 days with the same tabs open.
Ken
I've had FF use 600MB+ of memory many times (it is set to autoupdate, so it's the lastest FF). Even on my primary system (with 6GB RAM) Opera runs much faster than FF.
Hey guys, i've been doing some memory debugging of my own and have found an extension which causes firefox to hold onto memory :)
Cooliris (all versions up to current) is causing firefox to hold onto memory when single or multiple tabs are closed causing them not to release the entire amount of memory they were using.
To keep the test consistant i only opened 50 youtube.com tabs then closed them. The 50 tabs would use about 230-280MB's depending on amount of other extensions enabled (230 for only cooliris) and closing it SHOULD (and did with cooliris disabled) release atleast 100MB of it. and return to about 110-130MB's with only 1 tab open.
With cooliris enabled it only freed up to about 30MB's of it, so only dropped back to 200MB.
so it seems cooliris is causing a memory leak.
Doh, I liked that extension - so flashy.
Wait, i found another one :)
the nosquint extension is also causing memory to be held onto, though not as much as cooliris was.
Those who use nosquint will find similar function in the Default Full Zoom extension.
the developers of both plugins have been informed though :)
For a start, on a hunch, I disabled most of my Addons in FF3. Exited FF3 and entered again. Did that over a few cycles.
Guessed what I noticed? Something extremely strange. is happening. While i had Nosquint, Reframe and TabGroups Manager before, after I disabled these two, I should not be having their features right? But you guess it, their buttons are still there and their features are still alive.
That comes to the next point. Do we have to Uninstall to get rid of the Addons totally?
By the way, my memory after disabling most of my Addons are still same, VERY BAD. No improvement. I have almost like 70 plus Addons.
Lu, try running firefox in safemode, if the usage improves then it is still one of the addons.
the nosquint buttons were removed when i disabled it, are you using 2.0b6?
Also, anyone still using 3.0 should move to 3.5, several people now have mentioned memory issues still present in 3.0.11 are gone in 3.5
Squall,
If I tell you that I had disabled almost all my Addons, but they are still shown in my FF3, will you believe me? They are still in my context menu. ALL of them, not just nosquint, tabsgroup manager and reframe. I have 70 plus Addons and I disabled 60 of them. But I did not uninstall them. Maybe that is the reason but even then, it is strange.
I am using 3.0.11
I think I am the only one in the entire universe with this strange phenomenon.
No, disabling them disables them, like firefox doesn't enable them, so its as close to removing htem without doing so.
they should not be in context menu's, buttons should not be present. etc.
I think you might have a bit of profile corruption going on. grab mozbackup and export your profile to a file then delete the contents of the profile, then reimport the backup.
Squall,
Where can I get mozbackup?
I am using FEBE, which is an Addon. But not sure if it backups everything or not.
http://mozbackup.jasnapaka.com/
Squall,
After using Mozbackup to backup my whole default profile, I went into my profile and c & p the profile out to another directory and named it profile_copy.
Then I fired up Mozbackup and tried to restore my default profile, which I had backed up.
It shows me that my profile is corrupted and Mozbackup cannot proceed.
I wonder why.
Anyway, to cut the long story short, what I did was to copy back the profile_copy into the default profile.
Then I load up FF3. It worked.
My original profile is intact. But this time, all those Addons which I had disabled are no more on the UI. Bravo!
Those 14 Addons I have left enabled are:
Autopager, PlainOldFavoriates, QuickDrag, Session Manager, ShowIP, Site Information Tool, Sothink SWF Catcher, Tab Scope, Tab URL Copier, TextAloud Firefox Plugin, Toolbar Buttons, UnMHT, Uppity, View Cookies.
Note that when I fired up FF3, the cpu usage was 86Mb, with one tab opened. Then I started playing with my PlainOldFavorites and Session Manager again to confirm if the data are still there, the FF3 cpu usage shot up to 217Mb.
Now, without using or clicking on any of the two Addon buttons, the FF3 cpu usage had remained at 217Mb.
Over a period of one hour, the usage went up to 224Mb and stayed hovering around there.
I clicked on Session Manager and PlainOldfavorites to test the usage again. FF3 cpu usage shot up to 248Mb. After that, I released and the FF3 usage went back to 229Mb and remained as that.
I left the browser inactive for 1 hour.
Then I checked the FF3 cpu usage. It is down to 206Mb.
This time, I clicked on PlainOldFavorites. The FF3 cpu usage remained as 206Mb. Then I clicked on Session Manager. the FF3 cup usage went from 206Mb to 225Mb. When I released my focus from Session Manager, it returned to 205Mb.
Now, I opened additional blank tabs, total 5 tabs. FF3 cpu usage remained at 205Mb thereabout.
Next, I fill the blank tabs with www.Gmail.com and www.Yahoo.com FF3 cpu usage went up to 227Mb.
Next, I fill another blank tab with www.Alexa.com FF3 cpu usage remained at 227Mb.
Next, I fill another blank tab with www.Youtube.com FF3 cpu usage went up slightly to 235Mb
Now, I played a video there. FF3 cpu usage went up to 256Mb.
After the video had finished playing, FF3 cpu usage remained as 256Mb.
Then, I played another video. FF3 cpu usage remained as 256Mb.
Closed www.Youtube.com tab. FF3 cpu usage went down to 225Mb.
Closed www.Alexa.com FF3 cpu usage remained as 225Mb thereabout.
Closed www.Yahoo.com FF3 cpu usage remained as 225Mb thereabout.
Closed www.Gmail.com FF3 cpu usage went down to 216Mb.
Now, I am back to 1 tab opened. FF3 cpu usage hovers inactively at 215Mb.
On a hunch, I opened a tab (2nd tab) and addressed it to www.Yahoo.com. FF3 cpu usage remained at 215Mb.
Login to my Yahoo email. FF3 cpu usage remained at 215Mb.
Went to my Yahoo mails and played with them, and FF3 cpu usage went up to 230Mb and hover around there.
Signed out of my Yahoo email account. FF3 cpu usage went down to 217Mb.
Closed the www.Yahoo.com tab. FF3 cpu usage remained as 217Mb.
Opened 10 new blank tabs. FF3 cpu usage remained as 217Mb.
Use one of the blank tab and login to my www.Gmail.com FF3 cpu usage went up to 225Mb
Closed the www.Gmail.com tab. FF3 cpu usage went down to 219Mb
Closed all the 9 tabs that I opened recently. FF3 cpu usage remained at 219Mb.
6 hours passed since and FF3 cpu usage is still 217Mb.
That's all.
If anyone has similar readings like mine, then I am not alone. As to what is really hogging FF3, now we can more or less know.
They are:
Cheers!
Unfortunately my Firefox, on office's computer (a respectable Fujitsu Siemens with Intel Core2 Duo E8300 @ 2.83 GHz CPU and 2 GB of Ram) can takes over 1 GB of Ram by itself.
I'm a web developer, and I use Firefox (at 99%) for develop test (viewing and exploring the sources with FF powerfuls extensions) and for searches about technologies and hints on everithing I need (I rarely play flash games in launch-break).
About the memory usage of FF (3.5.1) on office's computer (with Win XP SP3), turned on since 9.15 this morning (3 hours and 30 minutes), it takes 1.160.992 KB (1.11 GB!!), and this value (the one in KBs) grows up of about 100 KB per second (now its 1.175.472 KB, 14 MB in 4 minutes).
Do you have any suggestion to decrease this "havoc"?
Sometimes, when RAM usage reachs and exceeds 1.4 GB i drastically "kill" process tree from Task Manager's Process view, then I restart FF and restore previous opened session (due to not lose opened windows and tabs).
I tried a few minutes ago to play with about:config configs and i set "browser.cache.memory.capacity" to 32768 (this parameter was not in the list, so I added), and "browser.sessionhistort.max_total_viewers" to 8 (it was -1 - "unlimited").
Now I'm going to restart FF and hope that this could fix my problem.
Bye, Tommaso
-1 means autoset, not unlimited.
set it to 1 or 2.
also. check your addons.
I find similar memory-hogging behaviour. My XP system is not tweaked in any way. Easily builds up to 0.5Gig memory (especially with pdfs but also without opening any) and it seems to continually increase and never decrease. I've always had a problem with firefox's memory footprint. Deleting tabs does not release memory. Clearing cache doesn't help much, if at all. Only way is to quit and start again. But perhaps some of the suggestions above will help.
I've installed and uninstalled FF 3.5 three times now. Each time it would do the same thing. Consume 1/2 my processing power, even when FF was not loaded, but at rest. Since I'm not the only one having this problem, it's not quite ready yet for prime time.
Recently, my own Firefox programs' memory use has been somewhat smaller and certainly within an acceptable range for the number of tabs/windows that are active. Perhaps their recent updates have made improvements on this issue.
What still annoys me is the "Firefox process is already running..." error message that comes up when I exit and then restart Firefox. This happens frequently on three out of five computers that I use at work or home. It requires killing the Firefox process in the task manager. I tend to exit all web browsers whenever I'm not using the Internet -- as well as manually stopping Internet traffic via the firewall -- as a security measure (call me paranoid, but it seems dumb to leave an open Internet connection during the 90 percent of the day that it is not in use).
@Lonny Stark:
Hey mate. It seems like one of your firefox's add-ons got some serious bugs. Try disabling/uninstalling them and see whether your firefox needs to be closed down using the Task Manager or not.
In regards with the memory usuage, I believe that mozilla guys have done some serious work in regards with fixing the possible issues since I have literally no problem running Firefox 3.5.1. My RAM usage has never gone above 150MB (even with multiple tabs open, running flash and java etc...)
This memory usuage is around the same area for OS X 10.5.7 [Leopard], Linux (KDE on OpenSUSE) and XP (i personally use all 3 OSs)...
Hope that you all upgrade and get the same result.
Mo
having the same problem here as well.
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OK, I know what your problem might be, are you using the password manger and saving forms, and searches, as this is one of the case to get a memory leak on FF3 at the moment I've been running mine for over 6 hours, and it is at 91,352K but sometimes I have seen it go very high like 300,000K
This is a well known issue which still persists. Average FF3 memory usage on my machine is 300Mb. And no add-odns are installed at all. Additionally, FF3 hogs over 90% cpu. Especially when loading image intensive pages, such as photoforum threads and etc. Normally we are talking about 5-10 640x480 JPEG images.
well i was having terrible memory problems, but removing a few extensions (in particular the Skype extension) fixed this. Now runs under 100MB. However, at times, upon closing, the EXE never terminates, and ends up hogging CPU time.
Somewhere along the way from 3.0 to 3.5.2 FF has become not just a memory hog, but a whole herd of swine.
Fully patched Vista 64 with 8GB RAM, 12GB page file, firewalled, free of spyware and virii (checked several times with different tools), is brought to it's knees simply by having FF sitting there with a dozen tabs open - even with all plug-ins disabled.
It starts out ok, then within a couple of hours, physical memory is down to less than 10% Free. Process Explorer doesn't show where this memory has gone either and even after shutting down FF, the system is still crippled. Any attempt to run anything else will then usually fail with an out of memory error. Reboot is the only way out. Believe me, I've tried to kill every process/service/app going that didn't crash the system, but no other way to recover. and no way to see where that missing 7.5 GB of RAM is.
If I don't run FF, I can run my system for days, even weeks, without issue, leaving loads of high use memory apps open and exceeding total physical memory, without problem.
Now this may not be just a FF problem, it may be FF under Vista64 and some interaction of how the two handle memory requests. MSIE8 does not have the same problem, that's for sure.
Unlikely are people using new fox profiles without extensions.
Of little use is firefox without at least adblock plus.
Extensions make the browser.
the browser ITSELF OUGHT make extensions play well together..
...especially if the extensions were developed by cretins
and in an OS/kernel agnostic way.
(Though support for 32bit vista ought be abandoned: an OS that cannot address enough ram per se to properly function is a waste of time and money.)
Running firefox on vista home personal (32 bit version) and have memory issues. A lot of sites cause memory leak issues. I have got it to almost crash my computer several times and had to force my computer to restart. I have 1 gig of ram and a lot of times firefox will be using 70% of it when it is memory leaking. It will start low then the memory usage will just keep climbing and climbing. I run much more intensive video games and they don't use as much memory. The sites I go on that cause it to memory leak is facebook and myspace which is an absolute joke.
rfoxall
Facebook eats more memory then myspace D: opened 10 tabs and immediately had it consume 300MB
with cooliris enabled, that would easily triple, and never get released........
I use the latest version of firefox and it's not just memory, it's cpu usage: it often gets up 90% and my computer freezes. I don't really know what's going on, this never happened in earlier versions. Yes, sometimes I do open a lot of tabs (over 20) but lately, it happens with just a few open...
disable your extensions then renenable 1 by one will you fine the one causing issues.
If I am on CNN.com where there are one-line headlines that are links to articles, and decide to "stack" up tabs with the various articles (I click the mouse wheel which opens a new tab behind the open tabs), THEN I notice my cpu % ramping up. My reasoning has been that the large number of animated advertisements (probably Flash) are hogging the machine.
not just flash, but also Gif's with alot of motion.
Has anyone tried the Orca Browser? It is based on the same gecko engine used in FF but is so much faster and does not hog memory in the same way FF 3 does. It only supports some FF extensions and this is the one downfall of it at the moment. If this browser can operate faster and with efficient memory usage then why can't FF3?
Further to my previous post I would be interested in other users' comments about the Too Many Tabs extension which runs a separate toolbar that open FF tabs can be "closed" to and which is supposed to preserve memory.
hi i have a question, i have disabled paging in my system [ which has 2 GB runs Win XP Pro SP3] and i am also addon heavy with atleast 25 addons installed
in the above config i have found FF3.5.3 to be using memory genrally in the range of 200 - 400 MB. it does not create any problems unless my overall memory reaches stratospheric levels of 1.4-1.7 GB [ 1.7 is the limit as 250 MB is allocated for video]
is the memory hog because of the no paging setting that i have done?
btw with no-paging setting my battery life has improved about 100% and response of all apps better by 50 - 100% [ this is some screwed up thing windows does that even if overall memory is way below the topline [ say around 800MB it starts paging bringing hdd into play!]
list your addons.
Maybe they're partnered with new PC and ram companies? Hmmm. And what's the deal with FF still not able to handle pdf files??? That's an embarrassment and frustration.
FF 3 on my machine take up upto 300 mB of memory with 10 -12 tabs open- nothing heave, just HTML. Funny thing is that the usage take a long while to go down even when I close the other tabs and keep just one or two open. It seems that FF keeps some threads open even after you close the tabs
For years I thought FF was Best Browser, but from version 1.5 and up, it gets worst and worst,including firebug which at the moment is a frozen peice of .... Firefox is best browwser? common, its all publicity from google and other big boys,I thought the same way , and then I took a closer look at Opera. if you have even a little technical knowledge and spend 5 minutes with Opera you realize that its at least 5 times faster than firefox and it always was that fast, and paradox is someone does not want users to know that. As we speak right now I have 7 Tabs open in Firefox and guess how much memory it takes : 500MB and its still slow, while I have Opera open as well with 11 tabs open and it only takes 140mb, record number that I got firefox eating my memory was 1.4GB yesterday. (I have 8 GB machine) and worst thing is that, tab browsing code is written in such a way that each tab directly impacts performance of all other tabs, so basically firefox with Tabs is useless its a hack that they keep patching up.
and that shows just what an uneducated fool you are.
Let me start by saying I am by no means an expert on browsers. I use FF3.5.3 on XPSP2[3GB RAM] and have been using FF for several years with the only major gripe to be the memory footprint (on whatever machine I use). I do notice that starting with FF3 the memory leak phenomenon has, if not rectified, been improved. I'm not qualified to say anything other than what I notice in terms of the final "Mem Usage" figure I see in task manager.
At least for FF, memory usage at any given time is a path dependent phenomenon of your browsing behavior. For example, after several days of browsing on a myriad of sites, some media, some pdf, some plain text, but reducing to 6-8 tabs of simple media sites, memory usage was near ~400MB. I proceeded to close, saving the tabs, and re-opening. At start-up, the memory usage was ~78-79MB, at the same 6-8 tabbed sites. It has now stabilized fairly well, after 15 minutes to ~88-92MB, with some jumps over and below this range. Of course, in 3 hours the range may drift upwards, but I don't anticipate it to do so unless I start opening new tabs or interact more aggressively with the browser.
There are perhaps sound functional reasons why the memory footprint should be a function of your browsing history (per sessinon), but from a user's perspective it seems silly. That is, for the dumb end-user (i.e. me), I should expect that my memory usage is only a function of what I'm doing at that particular time, not what I did for the 40 hours leading up to that time. I realize that some processes in memory allocation may be irreversible. If so, then this would seem to be like an exercise of the 2nd law.
So to sum up, make a point, and ask a few questions:
As a quick follow up to illustrate my point. My memory usage after I clicked "Submit" to my comment jumped from 88-92 to 100-102MB and perhaps climbing. That memory doesn't seem to be coming back. Why? Obviously memory needs to be allocated to send a message, but what memory is still needed after the memory is sent? Why wouldn't there be a deallocation?
I realize I don't understand how browser's allocate and manage memory at a low level, but for a non-technical observer with a modicum of understanding of computer memory and programming concepts, I would like to at least understand why FF behaves as it does so that my expectations are more reasonably formed.
Thanks to any repliers, and I promise not to post my memory usage after my next clicking of the Submit button (but you can bet it will be higher).
@Marc: Your honesty and humility are commendable. Hopefully, some people will end up listening to users' voice. In terms of UX, I'd imagine that if the user perceives a problem, even if it's the user's perception which is off, it means that the developer has a problem. Unless the product is only meant for fellow developers. In all honesty, I perceive it as a frequent disconnect, in FLOSS: developers and non-coding users have radically different expectations. Some developers may be quick to assign the blame on lUsers, but users are quick to switch to another solution. Adoption of Firefox and Linux have suffered from this. It may even be a problem with Twitter. Facebook, on the other hand, doesn't have that problem. The following post is, to me, an insightful take on a similar issue: http://mashable.com/2009/10/03/facebook-google-wave/
I'm running Vista-64 also. Just opened my Task Manager and FF was pulling nearing 1Gig of RAM. It's wasn't the first time I noticed it spiking after leaving it open when I'm streaming audio (who doesn't these days with the crappy antenae service we get). Guess, I'm switching back to IE8...sigh
squeel Leonhhart , ths one is for you.
please spend some time learning little more than how to be a ilitterate troll, offending other posters, if you lack basic aducation and/or if you are culturaly challenged,please do something else than trying to be smart. ty.
Learn to spell before calling people Illiterate.
Actually.. Just learn. There are multiple people within this blog commentary that have solved their memory issues, WHICH WERE CAUSED BY ROGUE AND POORLY MADE PLUGINS, among other things.
Though as with the laws of selection, some of you just fail with little to no excuse, its just a predominate trait that's all.
Just as an update from yesterday (since I waited a day, I technically consider this still holding true to my promise!), after having done a fair amount of browsing with 6 tabs open, visiting some media sites, etc., the Mem Usage is holding around ~180-200MB. The sites on each tab, moreover, are all set (except obviously one) to the Firefox+Google start page.
I'll assume parts of this memory increase are to improve my browsing performance by caching objects in memory so that repeated use or visitation of a certain page doesn't require reloading from site servers. Further, I would imagine FF controls how much caching it does via its interaction with the OS and depends on each person's memory capacity. This would explain, as I'm sure noted by other commenters, the different usages observed across different systems.
If this is the case, it would be perhaps a useful feature, if not currently available (I've only dabbled with the slew of configuration variables in about:config), to control the memory management more explicitly. For instance, perhaps there could be a setting that tells FF to release memory associated with certain sites if you either don't visit them for some time, or leave it all together.
Finally, I don't know if this is what some have done here, but it is superior to quote Mem Usage as a percent of total memory since someone with 8GB of RAM isn't likely to care about 300MB of usage. So with 2.5GB RAM, I'm looking at ~8% usage.
Not only is FF eating memory by the pound, but now it's a process hog average 20% CPU when I'm not even doing anything.
FF = 3.5.3
8GB Vista 64 here. To those that say that 300MB to 1.5GB is a drop in the ocean, or that FF is caching for performance, I'll just repeat the points already made by others:
I bought the extra RAM to use in other apps (video and audio editing), not for a browser with half a dozen pages open in the background.
It (FF) doesn't give the memory back, even when you exit the app. Other apps fail with insufficient memory, which wouldn't otherwise fail if FF had never been run from a fresh boot.
Yeah, Vista 64 probably doesn't like FF, or vice-versa.
Just because you don't have the problem, doesn't mean it doesn't exist for others, nor does it mean that their systems must be crap (read carefully how many people have had the issue manifest itself with clean installs, or on fresh VMs, with minimal, or no plugins). Yes, maybe it's the pages/sites that they load - which are no less valid content than whatever it is others like to browse.
That said, I've decided to just uninstall FF (personally I'd like to uninstall Vista too, but I'm not yet quite ready for the leap to *nix yet - although I am tempted each day, nor am I giving M$ more $s for W7 so that I don't have to deal with so many 64 bit related issues). Maybe sometime in the future FF under WV64 will have less memory issues, then maybe I'll revisit it.
My wife's computer is on 24/7. Latest Firefox with all tricks told here done and just Adblock Plus plugin, nothing else. It is ALWAYS running even when she is using other bits of software (only some graphics stuffl like Photoshop Elements or FastStone). Oh, and some sound editing as well, occasionally. She only turns of the computer once in two-to-four weeks.
After a run of maybe three weeks she came to me and said that the computer is acting in a funny way. The virtual memory was full, there was simply nothing left (the memory usage was almost 3 GB). And guess who the guilty one was?
Shutting down firefox took ages. I told my wife to restart FF every two or three days.
As for myself I am using FF 12 hours a day for web app development/debugging but I have learned to restart it at least once or twice a day as it gets really, really slow after hitting the 600 MB barrier. And, yes, it still does not release any memory. I am running all major browsers (IE8, FF3.5, Safari, Opera and Chrome) side by side every day testing the same sites and FF is the only one that is constantly causing trouble even though I have used a considerable amount of time trying to fine-tune it.
Those of the commentators (especialy Squall L) who are constantly insulting other users obviously never use FF more than a few hours at a time or never use web applications that make heavy use of JavaScript. It is the only explanation. Please, try running it for a week or so and please run lots of ajax applications.
@mv: Thoughtful and useful!
Brilliantly stated. Thanks, mv!
mv has summed it up perfectly. My experience has been exactly as mv stated except that I have 2 GB and am running Windows 2000 SP4.
I am however still interested in other comments about the Orca browser which I mentioned in an earlier comment.
mv,
it's possible that the AJAX-heavy sites are leaking memory. Yes, even a website can start to allocate memory indirectly and due to shoddy programming prevent Firefox from ever releasing it. This becomes quite pronounced if the website is never closed and the browser (any browser actually) runs for a prolonged time.
It would be interesting to know about which sites you are talking about.
Firefox is piece of crap now. I'm using five different OS combination's for development. Vista64, Vista32, fedora 11, ubuntu 32 and 64 bit. Firefox is sucking huge memory on all of them.
On my vista32 bit with firefox 3.5.3 and only firebug installed, within 2 hours I just had to shut it down using 310 MB of ram with only 4 tabs open. The sites open were only gmail, and three local sites I'm building.
If they don't get this figured out their finished. Way worse than IE right now.
Opera smokes it on Linux. Like other people mentioned, they didn't suck, but they sure do now. Websites don't make memory leaks, shitty browsers that can't handle them do.
if you had half a brain, you would've already discovered that FireBug causes the memory leak in your case.
Running firefox with 2 tabs an 2 greasemonkey scripts gets me to 590 pretty easily. Went to bed idling at 1.1gb (4 instances of firefox) an woke up to 1.8gb...
I totally agree with this. Firefox always is on top of my task manager in whatever system I use. I have a laptop, 2 desktops, and even our computers at work. Firefox is always number one on the memory usage in task manager.
Here's a screenshot from my newly formatted laptop. I just installed Windows and Avast. I've opened this site and only this site with Firefox 3 and IE 8. I haven't installed any Firefox extensions yet. Look at the significant difference in memory usage. How much more if I had extensions installed? This is true guys, Firefox reached 800MB usage on my desktop one time with probably 12 tabs open.
http://i.imagehost.org/0150/ff_mem_hog.jpg
You can't flipping compare IE to Firefox.
IE uses classes and DLL's that are built into windows itself. Firefox is self contained.
I must say since I have been using Firefox I find it a hell of a lot better than IE, IE for me was no good i would have to say in m,y experience Firefox is way better.