Description of problem: After I attempt to load one of certain web sites using Mozilla or Firefox with FC5, the system becomes completely unresponsive; no key combinations or mouse actions appear to have eny effect, nor anything short of reset or a power cycle. Even ssh sessions from remote machine, if any, become unresponsive. This does not happen with either Mozilla or Firefox under CentOS 4.3, or Konqueror under FC5, using the same hardware. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): mozilla-1.7.12-5 firefox 1.5.0.1-9 (as I type this, these appear to be the latest available, since I just ran a yum update on the machine in question) How reproducible: Completely, so far as I can tell. I have tried loading the page listed below under "steps to reproduce" several times over about a week, the last one right before typing this, and it has happened every time. I do not know whether it happens with other hardware using FC5, but since switching browsers under FC5 or switching Linux versions, as mentioned in the problem description, allows the page to load without incident, it does not seem to be merely a hardware problem. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Start Mozilla or Firefox under FC5 2. Make sure nothing is going on that you would really hate the system to crash in the middle of 3. Navigate to http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/march2006/230306googlecensoring.htm Actual results: System becomse completely unresponsive, and all evidence of processes continuing to run ceases, until a reset or power cycle. Expected results: The page should load without difficulty, as it does both in CentOS 4.3's Mozilla and Firefox and FC5's Konqueror Additional info: I will attach strace output from one of the crashes, FWIW, and will supply other hardware or software configuration details if requested. I do not know whether the problem has any hardware-specific aspects, but I do know that switching either browsers or Linux releases on the same hardware, as described above, allows the page to load without incident, so I can at least say it isn't strictly a hardware problem.
Created attachment 127637 [details] Bzipped output from a session of "strace mozilla", which ended in a crash as described for this bug
After testing this on a fully patched version of Fedora Core 5, I was unable to reproduce this bug. It appears that the latest version (1.5.0.2-1) has patched this bug.
I just reproduced the problem on the machine where I had verified it right before filing the bug report; then I turned off ACPI in the BIOS and was able to load the page without any trouble. As I mentioned, loading the page on CentOS 4 does not cause a lockup - even with the ACPI on, as it was until now. More recently I have tried the same thing with Fedora Core 4, and that doesn't lock up the system when the ACPI is on either. The system that locks up has a Biostar M7NCD Pro motherboard (i.e., it is NForce2-based) and does not appear to be unstable in general. So it doesn't seem to be a matter of bad hardware, but it seems to have something to with the way ACPI is handled on at least some hardware by FC5.
Several recent updates still do not seem to have fixed this bug, but adding "acpi=off" to the "kernel" line in grub.conf seems to be an effective workaround.
Just FYI, I am experiencing this same issue with FC5 (with all the latest updates) on a Dell Dimension 9150 (Pentium D). The above mentioned "acpi=off" work-around had no affect. This bug renders FC5 useless to me at the present time--as I utilize Mozilla/Firefox in my software development cycle.
With the latest updates I can now load the web page I was using to test this without having to use acpi=off to prevent a crash. However, in light of the previous comment, and the fact that the web page might have changed since over a month ago when I last checked, I don't know whether this means the bug has been fixed or not.
Fedora Core 5 is no longer supported, could you please reproduce this with the updated version of the currently supported distribution (Fedora Core 6, or Fedora 7, or Rawhide)? If this issue turns out to still be reproducible, please let us know in this bug report. If after a month's time we have not heard back from you, we will have to close this bug as CANTFIX. Setting status to NEEDINFO, and awaiting information from the reporter. Thanks in advance.
As I said, I wasn't seeing the problem anymore by 2006-06-21, and I don't see any comments after that indicating that anyone else was either, nor do I recall seeing any system lockups that seemed related to Firefox on Fedora since then. The last time I mentioned the subject, over a year ago, FC5 was still supported, whereas now it has been quite a while since I used either it or the hardware configuration where I first saw the bug (and the bug did appear to show up only with certain hardware configurations). I don't have a system physically set up that way anymore, or anything else (like a Dell Dimension 9150) where I would have known to expect the problem even way back when it first appeared. So my guess would be that the bug was fixed, but I don't think I am in any better position to verify that now than anybody else.
Closing per reporter's comment.