How-to Fix Slow Startups for Firefox 3.5

15Jul09

Whenever you discover yourself with longer than normal startup times after you upgraded to the new Firefox 3.5, you might have contracted a bug where Firefox 3.5 acquires the haphazardness it demands for protection purposes on Windows operating systems.

The operation postulates scanning a few temporary files (folders), searching for information typically contributed by operating system and other typical application operations. Firefox 3.5 searches for additional files and deeper subfolders for accumulated randomness, but it’s led to unforeseen events for users with excessively temporary files or folders that result in slower startup times.

Try builds are all the same being yielded with surefire fixes to this unfortunate bug, but several users describe a detectable improvement after erasing their Internet Temp files generated the IE and their temporary folders.

To clean out the temporary folders, check the following files and delete.  Please follow the example below:

C:\Documents and Settings\*user*\Local Settings\History
C:\Documents and Settings\*user*\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files
C:\Documents And Settings\*user*\Local Settings\Temp
C:\Documents And Settings\*user*\Recent

On Windows Vista /7:

%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\History
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent
%TEMP%

To erase Internet Temp Folders, go to the Control Panel and open up the Internet Options section. In your Browsing History area, click the Delete button and check off the options and click Delete.

A few users have reported a substantial betterment after performing these small steps, even for those of you who use IE occasionally.

A fix for the problem will be available with the patch Firefox 3.5.1, which is expected to be released in the next couple of weeks.

Filed under: Hacks, How-To, Windows Vista   |  5 Comments
Tags: firefox, folder, hack, How-To, internet, slow startup