Firefox and NVIDIA driver crash

[Bill]

Using FF 56.0.1 on Windows 7 64-bit. Even with all add-ons disabled and
a new profile FF will cause the NVIDIA driver to crash and reload. I get
the notice:

<snip>
Description:
Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered.
<snip>

When it happens, the screen goes black, flashes, and then the desktop
comes back. Whatever page I was looking at may or may not refresh
properly. Most of the time I have to close FF and open it again to
refresh properly, which is a drag.

The driver crash happens at any time within ten minutes of starting up
FF. The setting of hardware acceleration has no effect on this problem.

Has anyone else investigated as to why this happens? According to many
web forums, it's happening on a regular basis. I'd guess that 50% of the
time, this happens on Facebook -- usually when a GIF or a video starts.
I don't think it's FF itself that's the problem, but something on the
web page is causing it. I just can't narrow it down myself.

Bill

[PietB]

Bill wrote:
> Using FF 56.0.1 on Windows 7 64-bit. Even with all add-ons disabled and
> a new profile FF will cause the NVIDIA driver to crash and reload.

Do you have hardware accelleration (advanced options) enabled?
If so, see what happens if you disable it.

-p

[Bill]

Sorry. My other thread on this says I don't have hardware acceleration on.

[Bill]

On 10/25/2017 16:05, PietB wrote:

I meant other (initial) post.

[John McGaw]

This doesn't really help but I have the same OS and have run every version
of FF for years and have never seen the problem you describe. I have an
NVIDIA GeForce GTX950 and am presuming that the Nvidia driver would be
common on all of their adapters(?). Perhaps it really _is_ a Facebook
problem -- I have never been to the site. Yeah, I know correlation is not
causation (but it certainly is some of the time). Do any of these reports
in the forums have Facebook as a common factor?

[Bill]

Hard to tell as they aren't full of details, just gripes. It seems to
me, as a user/programmer/builder of computers for over 50 years, that
the common thread for my driver dying is something to do with videos or
movement of any kind on a web page, most notably Facebook, but it has
happened on other sites occasionally. It isn't just me, though. The
threads I read all mention "nvlddmkm.dll" as the driver component that
stalls and gets replaced. The whole process takes less than 5 seconds.

[TCW]

What OS and version are you using? What NVidia card? What driver
version? Have you tried with the newly minted NVidia 388.00 drivers? Is
the fan on your GPU running (if is not fannless)? It could be a million
things. =)

Going to Tools > Web Developer > browser Console and see if there's any
error there after a display reset might also help.

A FF 56.0.2 is about to be released but I've not yet seen the release notes.

[Bill]

As I said before, Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit. The video card is an NVIDIA
GeForce GT710 (387.92). Perhaps I should have made it clearer that this
happens ONLY when running Firefox and USUALLY when I'm on Facebook. This
isn't the work of hardware failing. I perform regular dust removal
maintenance on my computers and check all fans when I do. The event
viewer show nothing more than a warning and the text you see in my OP.

There is nothing significant in the browser console that affects or is
affected by video drivers or any web site.

Bill

[TCW]

Just for the sake of keeping drivers current, bump up to NVidia v388.00
and if it still reproduces, I can have you try a couple other things if
you're willing to go deeper into the rabbit hole. nvlddmkm.dll is
obviously an NVidia driver component so my hunch is it's a bug...but on
the Firefox side or NVidia side it yet to be determined. Also, how much
RAM does your system have? How much RAM does the GT710 have?

[Bill]

The system has 8G of RAM and the video card has 2G. I'll try the driver
update, but I don't hold much hope. This has been going on through the
last 2 driver updates. But, one can never tell--especially with
hardware/software.

Bill

[Lance]

I just updated to 56.02. In the release notes is "Fix for video-related
crashes on Windows 7 (Bug 1409141).

Hopefully, this will solve your problem.

Lance
*****

[Bill]

I'll have to wait and see, Lance. Thanks for the info.

Bill

[Arjen Meijer]

Op 26-10-17 om 16:30 schreef Bill:

I had the same problem. The source turned out to be an extension. Disable all extensions and see if the bug vanishes.

[TCW]

56.0.2 should either be live or about to be. The release notes mention a
crash fix for Win 7
(https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/56.0.2/releasenotes/) so maybe
that's you. See if you're able to update to 56.0.2 via Help > About >
Check For Updates.

[Bill]

Updated yesterday. Waiting to see if the crashes are fixed. Thanks.

Bill

[Bill]

On 10/27/2017 15:15, TCW wrote:

> On Fri, 27 Oct 2017 11:27:13 -0400, Bill <dhr...@gmailNOSPAM.com>
> wrote:
>
>> On 10/26/2017 12:15, TCW wrote:

<snip>

<snip>

>>
>> Updated yesterday. Waiting to see if the crashes are fixed. Thanks.
>>
>> Bill
>

> Definitely report back if it crashing has stopped.
>

Nothing so far, and I've investigated YouTube and Facebook rather
extensively.

[Bill]

Reporting back. Still no failures. Could be either/both Facebook and
NVIDIA fixed the problem.

Bill

[TCW]

So likely due to 56.0.2 fixes then?

[Bill]

Could be. Either that or something Facebook did.

[Mr. Man-wai Chang]

On 26/10/2017 11:56 PM, Lance wrote:
>
> I just updated to 56.02. In the release notes is "Fix for video-related
> crashes on Windows 7 (Bug 1409141).
> Hopefully, this will solve your problem.

Would the patch make Firefox work better with BOINC clients? I am
wondering....

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[TCW]

On 10/30/2017 12:01 PM, Mr. Man-wai Chang wrote:
> On 26/10/2017 11:56 PM, Lance wrote:
>>
>> I just updated to 56.02. In the release notes is "Fix for video-related
>> crashes on Windows 7 (Bug 1409141).
>> Hopefully, this will solve your problem.
>
> Would the patch make Firefox work better with BOINC clients? I am
> wondering....
>

Only one way to find out. Update your NVidia drivers as well.