Firefox 2 illegal operation and shut down

Windows 98SE and Firefox 2.0.0.2.0. Have started to regularly get 'This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down'. The cause contains 'Firefox caused an invalid page fault in module <unknown> at 0000:04666cd
Firefox Help chat pointed out that these systems are no longer supported but suggested I try removing the Yahoo tool bar Add On. This has made no difference.

First thing would do is upgrade firefox and see if that helps.  The latest is 3.5.5 or there is a 3.6 beta ver 3 that works fine.

Thanks for that suggestion. I have tried that but Firefox 3 cannot be installed on a Windows 98 system. And Firefox no longer support Firefox 2 while Microsoft no longer support windows 98.

[Moderator]

FireFox2...Old Versions

Forget about support...install it and it will run.

I have downloaded Firefox 2.0.0.20 and the message came up about Firefox Setup 2.0.0.20. It did not run and when I saved it to disc I could not then find it. This could be because that is the version presently installed. Should I uninstall the existing Firefox on the presumption that it is corrupted and the download and install?

Firefox 3.5 loads pages about 10 times faster than version 2.  That alone is a good reason to upgrade.

And if you check patio's link, Firefox will work all the way back to Win 95.

I have checked patio's link and looked at system requirements for various versions of Firefox. Firefox 3 doe not work with Windows 98 so I am stuck with the last version of Firefox 2, which is the one installed at the moment. That is why I asked the question about uninstalling it.

Why don't you think it will work?  To quote the link.

Software Overview

Website: http://www.firefox.com/
Software Provider: Mozilla Foundation
Current Version: Firefox 3.5.5
Operating Systems: Windows 95, 98, Me, 2000, XP, Vista
License: Open source (Freeware)

It can't hurt to uninstall version 2, especially if it's not working.

That quote is misleading. No Firefox 3 works with Windows 98. I will uninstall Firefox 2.0.0.20 and then download and install Firefox 2.0.0.20 I will report back in due course. Thanks for the comments.

Just to end this sidebar- FF3 does not work on Windows 2000 or below. period.

The installer for FF3 GPFs in Win98 and ME, anyway; and Win95 reports that it is linked to a missing Shell32.dll export, SHBrowseForFolderW. (there are very few "W" functions on win9x, and those that do exist are stubs; the "W" stands for "Wide" and are unicode functions. NT is designed on Unicode; 9x is designed on ANSI. a "Dumpbin /imports" on my installed copy of FF3 reveals that it imports no ANSI functions where a Unicode equivalent exists. Therefore it will not run on windows 95 or 98 without some sort of emulation of these functions. UNICOWS does not provide adequate emulation of these routines to help in this instance.


My recommendation would be to try an older version; maybe even 1.5.

BC_programmer.
I do not understand the details you provided other than that I cannot install Firefox 3 on my Windows 98 machine. I used Firefox 2 for years without any problem until recently. What is wrong with my plan to uninstall Firefox 2.0.0.20 and then download and install another copy of Firefox 2.0.0.20. ? Why do you recommend that I go to an earlier version?

BC_programmer.
I do not understand the details you provided other than that I cannot install Firefox 3 on my Windows 98 machine. I used Firefox 2 for years without any problem until recently. What is wrong with my plan to uninstall Firefox 2.0.0.20 and then download and install another copy of Firefox 2.0.0.20. ? Why do you recommend that I go to an earlier version?

If your reinstallation doesn't work, then try an older version. It might be that FF automatically updated to a newer version in the 2.x line, but the update made it incompatible with Win98, or something.

I will try the re-installation and report back in due course as I need to give the new installation several days of operation to be reasonably sure that it will not crash.

I reinstalled Firefox 2.0.00.20. It crashed soon after. The message contained Firefox caused an invalid page fault in module <unknown> at an address that was different to the previously recorded address. I had a similar crash with Excel that I had not mentioned because it was a one off event while Firefox crashes several times a day in recent weeks.

I'm a big Firefox fan, but you are right that they don't support Win 98 with ver 3.5.

Why not go to IE or another browser then?  I'd trade some of the FF features for a stable browser any day.

I used to use Internet Explorer but changed to Firefox when I had a crashing problem with IE and I could not get advice on how to fix it. I have managed to fix it in recent days. I would like to stick with Firefox now. I just reinstalled Firefox 2.0.00.20 and it crashed. I will reinstall Firefox 2.7 as I cannot recall that version ever crashing. I will advise what happens. thanks for the suggestion.

I reinstalled Firefox 2.0.0.7 but it also crashed. I then went back to Firefox 2.0.0.20 and it has crashed so often that I am now using Internet Explorer. I would like to get back to Firefox as I have bookmarked many pages. I expect  it is a problem that is easily fixed but Firefox Help people have not been much help because they no longer support Firefox 2. I have had no response from the Firefox Forum.

[Moderator]

Try this version...

Thanks for that suggestion, patio. I uninstalled Firefox 2.0.0.20 and then downloaded firefox 2.0.0.17 It would not instal. however. There was a message that access was denied. I do not know how to overcome that.

Thanks rthompson. I am now using both FF 2.20 and IE. I suspect FF crashed only when I was using Yahoo Mail. I will check that out and report back.

I am still having the problem. It has occurred 5 times in the past two days and each time it was when I transferred to Yahoo Mail from another site. However, it does not always crash when I go to Yahoo Mail. I will continue to kkep a log of the crashes to see whether there is some consistent symptom.

[Moderator]

I'd consider switching to GMail...
With all the fluff yahoo has added to their mail site over the last 6 months i rerely if ever use it anymore...

Thanks for that suggestion, patio. I have saved many posts to Yahoo Mail folders. I expect these can be copied to Gmail folders if I change.

I have tried to run Profile Manager for 98 using firefox.exe -Profile Manager but I get the message that FF is open, when it is not. I have shut down the computer and re-booted. That makes no difference. The crashes are still occurring.