Firefox 4 occasionally hanging when opening a PDF in browser

[fp252]

Sometimes, when attempting to open a PDF file within Firefox 4 (on both RC1 and the final release), the entire browser will hang and not respond for about a minute. During that minute or afterwards, one of three things will happen:
a) the file will open properly;
b) I will get a grey page stating that "The PDF-XChange Viewer plugin has crashed" and asking if I'd like to send a crash report, and/or reload the page and try again;
c) Continue to not respond indefinitely.

Again, it doesn't happen every time, but instead anywhere between 1/5 to 1/20 of the PDFs I attempt to open in-browser. It seems no specific file in particular is causing this. I can't seem to reproduce this in other browsers (IE9, Chrome).

Also, I'm using PDF-Xchange Viewer viewer 2.5, build 193.0 on Windows 7 Professional 64-bit.

Any ideas why this is happening, or how to fix it?
Thanks in advance.

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello fp252,

I have aksed one of the guys working on our browser plug-ins to take a look at this topic, and he confirmed that we can not guarantee the stable operation of our plug-in until Mozilla makes an official stable version, as trying to fix something now could be in vain as the browser could change from the current state it is to it's final version.

Best,
Stefan

[papaminimaus]

Hi,

Firefox 4.0 is stable from today on, and i can confirm the pluging keeps hanging.

Yours,

Arne

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello Arne,

A couple of hours ago it was still 3.6 that was listed on the official Mozilla site.
I do see that they have changed that so our developers are investigating.

Best,
Stefan

[Vasyl - PDF-XChange]

Hi Arne,

We cannot reproduce this issue with last Firefox4. May be this problem depended with some documents. Can you provide some pdf-URLs for reproducing the problem?

Best
Regards.

[papaminimaus]

Hi,

i tried this one for example: http://www.gs-ostenfelde.de/_private/Te ... in_2kl.pdf

Win7, 64Bit, Firefox 4.0, PdfXchange Viewer 2.5 Build 193.0, Feb 15 2011 21:26:46

The Plugin works perfectly in Iron with this File.

Yours Arne

[stephan123]

Having the same problem here. Firefox hangs occasionally, when I try to view a PDF in browser.

[TMiB03]

I did not have any issues with that link.
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit, Firefox 4.0 Xchange viewer 2.5 build 193

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hi All,

Seems like some of you are having issues, and others aren't.

We are unable to reproduce the crash on our end, so those with problems please try to do a complete reinstall of both FireFox and (if needed) our Viewer as well.
It is possible that the update from a RC to the stable FF version could have left some trails, so please try whether the reinstall will resolve the problems for you.

Best,
Stefan

[malungu]

Hi,

it seems that there is a problem with the PDF-Xchange viewer plugin in Firefox 4. My Firefox 4 (Windows XP Home Edition SP3) often crashes when I try to open a PDF file with the plugin. But this happens at random, even with one and the same file, which may or may not cause Firefox to crash. Try this one: http://www.netbank.de/nb/downloads/Karte_entsperren.pdf

Best regards
malungu

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

Hi malungu,

I installed FF4 on an XP SP3 machine and cannot get that link to crash FF or the Viewer addin.

When I installed FF4 it asked if I wanted to upgrade the existing FF3 which I did. Did you do an upgrade or fresh install? I'm also wondering what other addins you have - perhaps there is something we can find in common here between those of you who are reporting the crash?

[malungu]

Hi Paul,

I attach the about:plugins printout of my Firefox 4 installation. It was reinstall, not an upgrade from FF 3.6. Maybe this helps.

malungu

[Cadillakin]

Im also getting crashing. It seems that FF has plenty of memory to work with.. Nevertheless, the Xchange Viewer crashes at random.

[Cadillakin]

I also created a new profile in Firefox4 with no add-ons. The crashing is still there.. so it's unlikely that it has anything to do with conflicts within the add-ons. It's still possible that the plugins Firefox is using may be conflicting... I just don't know...

I sent you guys about 15 crash reports from the last 5 hours here. I was researching and the crashes were frequent.

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

Hi Guys,

Can you try build 194 please. It's on the site now and we did some work to address this. I'm keen to hear how that works for you.

[malungu]

Hi Paul,

I have opened quite a number of PDF documents in build 194 now, and Firefox has not crashed a single time. It seems that the problem is solved.

Thanks a lot!

malungu

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

HI malungu,

thanks for that. This is most encouraging! Please be sure that if you, or anyone else reading this post do find one that you let us know here asap.

[Cadillakin]

Here is my best guess...

As an owner of Xchange 4.0, I get the included viewer. Occasionally, I have looked for updates within the viewer itself and not bothered updating Xchange Pro. Version mismatch. Yes. But I never thought much about it. I've had crashing problems on previous versions of Firefox, as well.. not just this new version 4. I've also noticed that I have two separate entries for PDF Xchange.. in the Add/Remove section of Control Panel. They both show up as 65 mb's or so. That number is about right for the full version of Xchange Pro with included viewer.. but way too high for the viewer installation alone. A problem there.. Windows is not seeing the installation of the viewer separately..

Thus, my conclusion is there is some kind of memory issue when using separate versions of the Xchange software (viewer and Pro printing modules) When I removed them both, and installed only Xchange 4 with included viewer, no more crashes.. And I tested it vigorously... All is stable now.. with only one version installed and listed in Control Panel, Add/Remove.

[John - Tracker Supp]

Hi,

I suspect also there was an older version of our FF plugin which may have caused conflicts - If you have a 'older/dated' release, certainly it is better to uninstall all, check all is removed and restart and install the latest releases as these now ensure that a common folder heirachy is used across all products - irrespective of whether purchased independantly or as a combined bundle such as the full PDF-XChange PRO suite.

I also strenuously reccomend all users to use the zip/exe installers unless they specifically have a need to use the MSI installers offered - as these feature the 'check' for updates option and do update whereas until the next major version releases the MSI installer's do not.

Version 5 of the PDF-XChange Driver/PDF-Tools products should also incorporate the 'check for updates' option too.

[fp252]

I upgraded to the latest version of PDF-Xchange (build 194.0) a couple of days ago. I've opened numerous files in-browser, and haven't experienced any problems after upgrading.

Thanks taking care of the problem!

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Pleasure fp252!

Best,
Stefan