Need some help from one of you computer experts, please. All of a sudden I can't get any web pages to load in Firefox. I get "Server not found" message for all of a dozen or so reliable sites. I have a good connection; I can bring the sites up in IE with no problem. Never had this problem before. Nothing has changed since I last successfully used FF on this machine 3 days ago, that I know of. At least I haven't knowingly changed anything, and I'm the only user. FYI, it's FF 2.0.0.11 on Windows XP Home Edition. My connection is via Sprint mobile broadband, showing a good signal and connection speeds. Any ideas? Many thanks in advance.
Clear private data in Firefox. Shut down Firefox, do cntl+alt+del and look for any instances of firefox.exe in task manager and shut them down. Start Firefox back up. Select "start new session" if asked. Off hand, it sounds like port trouble and should be cleared up by doing the above.
Well since IE works ( not very well ) then it sounds like a firewall is blocking FF. Did you install a firewall or mess with your firewall settings? Do you use a firewall? Norton? McAfee? ZoneAlarm? Windows XP firewall? If you use any of these disable it and try FF.
http://forums.mozillazine.org/ Go to Firefox's support forums, they're the real experts. I've had the problem you're having but was able to clear it up myself. The only other thing I can think of is the connection settings in Firefox need some changing. You may have proxy setttings that you don't need or encryption settings need to be changed.
Jay, I first thought about the firewall but I figured it was site-specific and not browser-specific. Nonetheless, I tried your advice of disabling it, and still no success. I'll try rebooting again shortly to see if that matters, but I don't think it will. Desync, going back to IE permanently is a last resort. But you got me to thinking: Maybe a recent FF update is the culprit. When I have a few minutes later I'll go to Mozilla's site to see if there's a newer version and download it.
Thanks, Jack. I hadn't thought of that. Out of sight, out of mind. I guess I knew the forum existed, but FF typically is so problem-free that I've had no use for it.
How the heck would a firewall be blocking one browser and not another? It's all TCP 80. . Did you set a proxy [or did something set it for you] and you can't reach whatever that proxy setting is? I believe FF keeps its own notion of proxies, and that *would* survive a cache-clear/reboot. . _H*
Some of the Internet security programs keep an access list for each application, including port rules for each. Even though all the browsers will be going through port 80, some may be denied access. In this case it's more of an outbound firewall than the normal "keep the world out" firewall. Tom
Think about it: there is quite a difference between a bonafide browser, accessing the internet over port 80 and a Trojan Horse, sending private sensitive information collected from you computer over that same port 80. Every client-side firewall worth that name has rules that are application bound. Each individual application that wants to use port 80 outbound has to be granted permission for that. If not, the protection is essentially useless against the most dangerous threat these days. Good firewall application even check the application's binary checksum to verify if there hasn't been tampered with. You can check the active rules for the firewall, and verify that the currently used version of Firefox still has all necessary priveledges
Many thanks again to all who responded. I'm on my laptop now -- using FF; the problem machine is my desktop box. When I can put the two machines side-by-side (they're currently at different locations), I'll compare all FF and firewall settings between the two. If I can't find something that needs to be reconfigured, I'll post something on the FF forum.
I've gotten all of the recent updates and not had any trouble on either my Macs or my Windows box any step of the way. Your individual situation, whatever that may entail, is the problem. If it was with a Firefox update, per se, I would be experiencing it too. One question, though, are you using the ad block plus plugin with Firefox?
Yeah, I got to thinking about that after my last post. That will probably be the first thing I try when I get back to my desktop later this week. Many thanks!
You just need to download the "make my browser work" open-source plug-in from SourceForge! Of course, it was built against build .1752 of FireFox, so who knows if it's still compatible. You know you wanna: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/downloads/ie/getitnow.mspx
Firefox fails to work with some sites. When that happens I use Safari. IE "works" with more sites, if by "works" what you mean is that it lets hackers into your computer. I've never felt better about computing than I have since I gave Bill the boot.
If you think that Firefox is a 'safe' browser, take a look here: http://www.mozilla.org/projects/security/known-vulnerabilities.html#Firefox I use Firefox myself (mainly because it has the best compatibility wit SVG), but it's not without it's share of problems. The recent flood of updates clearly illustrates that. Particularly Firefox's implementation of JavaScripts seems to be a mess. The Firefox developers are quickly learning that having double digit market share has some nasty consequences (like M$ knows for years). Hackers start to keep a close eye on Firefox vulnerabilities. And, quite conventient for them, many of those vulnerabilities work equally well on Windows, OSX and Linux.