Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

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blind12
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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-08, 18:52

Funny, it folded together again silently, this time leaving no crash WER-file either. sessionstore.js is 2,5 hours old

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-08, 19:05

Sandboxie is just for testing and security. Keyscrambler I just installed 2 days ago because I was concerned with security. Things haven't gotten worse since then :)

The small temp profile I made for testing doesn't seem to crash but maybe it just doesn't push the limits to where problems start having effects.

This is not an old installation, I'm not sure yet that a new one would necessarily be cleaner or better, most of the problems were around from almost the very beginning.
If I do reinstall then I'll first test things some more on the old system :)

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-13, 14:38

Is there a method to force Firefox/Palemoon to save browser state/session during use? It is running but sessionstore.js is very old so it is not saving its state.

I have noticed this lagging behind in previous installations/older versions so it isn't specific to this installation/profile/computer/OS. Of course older versions were much more likely to lose session data completely so I resorted to session-saving addons, but total loss of sessions hasn't happened in recent versions.

Loss of state-saving, degrading addon functionality etc after some use has survived though, I noticed this in the past so it shouldn't be specific to this installation/computer/OS. Failure of Estonian ID card Firefox driver/plugin after some use has been confirmed by others so there does appear to be something degrading in use.

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Blacklab » 2013-03-13, 15:03

@blind12: This mozillaZine forum topic might be of interest: http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic ... &t=2415281 and also their "Session Restore" Knowledge Base article: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Session_Restore

Assume Session Manager 0.7.9.6 was the Add-on you tried? It has a massive Support thread on mozillaZine all about the detail of this topic here: http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic ... &start=900

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Moonchild » 2013-03-13, 15:20

Unfortunately your reported problems are very a-typical for Pale Moon, and the only thing I can think of is that there must be some sort of system run-time interference on your particular Windows setups causing it.
If you say it occurs across computers and OSes, with different unrelated profiles, then you need to be looking for what common factors are between your different computers. Common configurations you do in Windows that go beyond basic personalization, common software installed on all of them (Firewall/AV/system software/tools/etc.), etc etc.

There is no easy way to manually trigger a session save unless you install an add-on like the Mozilla-created Session Manager
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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-13, 15:29

The degrading functionality has been reported by others on totally different installations (vanilla Firefox, not Palemoon, I'm not suggesting it's specific to Palemoon), and my own installations have been very different (I previously used WinXP, I now use Win7). Very few addons are the same, only AVG has been in all my computers. Maybe 64-bit OSes fare better, I use 32bit for fear of breaking some old tools.

Session Manager caused long hangs/lags while saving sessions in the past. There apparently is an addon that forces Internal sessionmanager to save session, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefo ... e-session/. Unfortunately it requires a restart and my sessionstore.js is very old already... EDIT: D'mn the Save Session addon doesn't add any functions, it just enables-disables saving.

EDIT: Whew, my Palemoon managed to flush sessionstore.js to disk when restarting. Is it possibly held in memory for hours so it gets lost in crashes? If so then I just need to force it to flush to disk somehow.

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Moonchild » 2013-03-13, 19:10

The session gets saved to disk every 60 seconds in Pale Moon (every 10 seconds in Firefox).

If AVG is the only common factor, then it may very well be the culprit -- just disabling it will not necessarily provide conclusive evidence as such software is notorious for never being fully disabled. Only a complete clean uninstallation of the suite will give you more information if it is indeed the problem.
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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-14, 03:14

I removed AVG awhile ago but it may have introduced system changes. I can see there are some files left behind so there might be other changes left behind.

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-25, 19:24

WIndows Memory test and memtest86+ did not report errors but they both ended in a shutdown so I replaced memory units with ones that tested without problems. Stability seems better but mozalloc.dll crashes still occur and sessionstore.js is over half an hour old at the moment and is not updating.

I wish there was a way to force (internal) state save if the autosave somehow breaks. There is an external Session Saver but it had its own problems.

Is there a way to track down what loads kernelbase.dll into Palemoon? Does the Dependancy Walker http://www.dependencywalker.com/ have any relevance?

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Moonchild » 2013-03-25, 22:33

If memory testing does not complete and shuts down your system while testing, you definitely have an issue with hardware. Please get your computer checked out. Swapping out memory for different modules may avoid immediate problems depending on the speed/stability of the modules, but won't necessarily give you a stable overall system.
Of course it's unlikely if you are using multiple different physical computers (I'm not sure if this is the case? You mentioned it not being related to computer/OS) that they would all be affected, but if it's a single computer, then hardware is very likely the only cause. Overheating, bad motherboard, and similar can all cause these kinds of issues.
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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by blind12 » 2013-03-26, 05:44

Moonchild wrote:If memory testing does not complete and shuts down your system while testing, you definitely have an issue with hardware. Please get your computer checked out. Swapping out memory for different modules may avoid immediate problems depending on the speed/stability of the modules, but won't necessarily give you a stable overall system.
Of course it's unlikely if you are using multiple different physical computers (I'm not sure if this is the case? You mentioned it not being related to computer/OS) that they would all be affected, but if it's a single computer, then hardware is very likely the only cause. Overheating, bad motherboard, and similar can all cause these kinds of issues.
The replaced memory units test endlessly without errors with memtest86+ so there shouldn't be any hardware issues on this computer any more. It seems the stability is better but not great.
New profiles don't crash until I load tons of tabs, then they get unstable, too.

And it appears to a "common wisdom" that Firefox is unstable with tons of tabs? There are also tons of discussions on memory handling and allocation problems, I seem to recall that failure to allocate is not properly handled and causes a crash, the discussions were old though so things may have changed?

I have used multiple physical computers but I use only one now, the other ones had WIndows XP, this one has Win7 Ultimate 32bit. One common denominator that I remember is that all have had AVG at some point. Some addons and plugins are also the same, although versions are likely different. Foxit PDF viewer is the same, FF/Palemoon hunts down and loads its Quicktime plugins that are older versions, 7.6.6. I'll probably disable them. I have recently enabled click-to play anyway to escape the hideous autoplaying videos/audio on many webpages so I think they don't load?

Another common denominator between installations is also the ADHD "tons-of-tabs" thing :)

I noticed that Firefox/Palemoon by default hides plugins without associated extensions so I'll probably clean up that section as well.

I still wonder what loads kernelbase.dll.

Sessionstore.js occasionally seems to wake up and update after a long break.

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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Moonchild » 2013-03-26, 08:30

Pale Moon has no real issue with a very large number of tabs; in fact it seems to handle it a lot better than the Mozilla builds. Sure, you will be using more memory, but otherwise it should be fine. I do suggest you use the "don't load tabs until selected" feature in that case, since you'll be using a needless amount of resources otherwise by loading all tabs even if you're not actively using them in that particular browsing session. Do keep in mind that tabs in principle are meant to be transitional elements - permanent storage of locations should be done with bookmarks.

Every tab added does add some CPU overhead as well, of course, if they are active. If your hardware is unstable for some reason, this may compound the problem.

As for kernelbase: did you try what I suggested: make a new, clean Windows user account and run Pale Moon in that to see if problems are alleviated? Because that is what Microsoft hints at as a solution for system run-time issues involving this library.
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Re: Lots of crashes with mozalloc.dll

Unread post by Moonchild » 2013-04-12, 13:26

Doing some further research on both issues, I found a possible cause:
If you have the DirectX SDK installed it may be using a debug version of the DirectX libraries which may trip with this breakpoint error.
Since Pale Moon uses DirectX for its hardware acceleration, this could be the culprit?

Refs:
http://smartclientfactory.blogspot.se/2 ... nnect.html
http://joewirtley.blogspot.se/2008/05/h ... d-one.html
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