Windows Vista Browser stops working after a while

I have just recently built a new pc

Intel q9550 2.8 quad
4 gb ddr2 1066mhx ram
gigabyte radeon 4870x2
vista home premium 64 bit.
avast anti virus and zone alarm firewall

have had this exact problem from the start, can surf the web with Mozilla or ie for any time between 10 minutes - 2 hours from boot. web browsing eventually slows down to a halt and then stops all together, while programs such as msn messenger, steam etc still run fine. only solution is to reboot, which is really inconvenient.

have tried a few things such as reinstalling web browsers, enabling / disabling other anti virus programs, but nothing which has sorted the problem out entirely.

with avast however, disabling and enabling the web shield once the problem has occurred seems to reset something, as i can then continue to surf the web as i was. if this is a vista problem, and im pretty sure it is since this never happened with xp, then i am happy to just reset the web shield until some sort of fix comes up.

hope this info is helpful :)
 
Howdy all,

Was experiencing the same extreme frustration incurred by the browser dying after x mins.

Only purchased my laptop 3 mnths ago with Vista Home Premium.
I installed ZoneAlarm Free on it pretty much straight away so assumed that the problem was a Vista bug.
However after reading most of this thread and seeing others resolve the prob by removing I gave it a go and now do not have the problem.

Have seen that not everyone with this problem has ZA but if you do try unistalling it.

Have had a week of sweet, uninterupted browsing!!:p
 
This is obviously not the same problem as the one reported by Nzealander and me. In your case it was the router or network card.

I tried this and a lot of other things, but only a reboot solves the problem for me, just like Nzealander.

Our problem is (and this is double-triple checked):
- Not in the router (even removed it, so this is indisputable)
- Only in browsers (MSIE and Firefox) and sometimes Windows Mail + Windows Live Messenger, i.e. applications using Windows standard web library
- All other applications are unaffected
- The only remedy is to reboot (hibernate+restart etc. does not work)

Admittedly, I was using google to find other users with this issue.. and here we are. I have not read the entire thread yet, but I wanted to drop my input on this.

I have the same problem. Its not DNS related becuase I can still ping domain names through command prompt. I can still use online games, and FTP applications. The browsers just cease to work until I do a full reboot. This did not always happen. When I first got Vista it worked without any issues for over a year.

The solution I found was profile related. I created a new profile in Vista and copied my desktop items across to it. Logged in and I have not had this problem re-occur as of yet. Its been a week. Normally I would experience the problem daily when I leave my PC on for several hours. The new profile I have left on almost non-stop 24/7 and not experienced a problem with the browser again.

I actually like Vista alot.. this was just an extremely inconvenient bug.

Running Windows Vista home premium 32-bit.
 
Well. I've been having the same exact problem as described.

My machine is a brand new ASUS Laptop, barely broken in (got it at the very end of March)

2.13 Ghz x2 (Core Duo 2)
4 GB RAM
Vista Home Premium

Essentials:
Trend Micro Anti-Virus (trial, will replace when it expires)
Zone Alarm (which I am now HIGHLY suspecting)
Mozilla Firefox 3.x (downloaded and installed today).

That's it. You see, this is the SECOND time Vista has been installed on this same laptop; In frustration, I reloaded the entire OS from scratch today. I had the problem return within minutes of me finishing the installation of my essential security software.

I am having the same issue as described: All other internet-related processes and services work perfectly fine, but the brower(s) commit virtual suicide after a random amount of time.

To emphasize the difficulty I had with this bug, it eventually corrupted my TCP/IP and started making RPC errors that prevented EITHER of my NICs from doing even the basic things like pinging loopback.
I used SFC /runnow to repair those and got my Laptop back in order, but the problems that lead up to this still persisted. Figuring I had encountered a new malware or other bug, I reverted to factory defaults and performed the "wipe all partitions and reinstall Vista".

Now, I'm having the same exact problems on a BARE-BONES clean install of Vista where the sole additions I have made to it are Mozilla Firefox and Zone Alarm (in addition to activating and updating the Trend Micro Anti-virus that came with the computer).

I am a modestly accomplished network engineer and a career IT computer technician; and this bloody thing has been plaguing me ever since I got the laptop. Nothing else shows signs of Malware, tampering or other risk factors. The web traffic on all browsers will just cease, and only two things will unlock it.

1) Reboot 100% effective, but temporary.
2) Waiting for the computer to go through Screen Saver into power saving mode. "Unlocking" the computer from this state frees up my browsers for a time, but I suspect this to be a red herring. Worth mentioning.

I ordered Windows Update to try to see if there were any fixes put into the latest patch; what with my laptop being unable to surf the internet for the better part of 3 weeks (and do nothing at all once the RPC and TCP/IP errors began, though I fixed those independantly of the original problem yesterday).

And the problem transcends routers and faulty DSL systems; I'm typing this from my old arse Dell Desktop using a Wireless NIC on the SAME EXACT DSL that my laptop used. Zero problems on Windows XP.

I'm hoping my situation provides a few more details that weren't clear before; though I could very well be an isolated case, the trend I followed on this thread suggests otherwise.

I look forward to hopefully stamping this bug out for good.
 
Hi Atmos,

Try replacing ZoneAlarm by another firewall, e.g. Comodo. It worked brillant for me on two laptops that both had this very same problem (browser stops after a while); I'm convinced for me the combination ZoneAlarm and Vista caused the conflict. The combination XP and ZoneAlarm still gives no problems by the way.
 
Atmos,

I never had a single problem using ZoneAlarm with XP on three computers. I have replaced two computers which have Vista Home Premium. Both had issues with ZoneAlarm.

I had ZoneAlarm on my laptop along with AVG Antivirus and had the browser issues for over a month. Once I unistalled ZoneAlarm and replaced it with Comodo firewall, my browswers have worked perfectly. No further problems. I'd be willing to bet ZoneAlarm is your problem too.

Hope it helps.
 
Atmos,

Uninstall ZoneAlarm and run with Windows Firewall for a couple of days and see how it goes. Make sure ya post you results!
 
Well. I have the install for Comodo at the ready and will post the results later.
I first need to fully remove Zone Alarm.

Aside: I had a previous Vista Laptop (now a doorstop, curse you crappy warranty!!) that ran Zone Alarm with zero issues.
So my guess is that something in SP1 or one of those many many updates is the culprit here.
 
Well, the procedure has been unsuccessful so far. I removed Zone Alarm, but have not yet installed Comodo.
(FYI: Windows Firewall is running.)
Heck, it ceased to function as I was trying to access this website to report the results, how's that for irony?

So, I'm currently using Express Gate's web browser to reply (some neato firmware built into my laptop), and until I can figure out what Microsoft has been smoking, I'll probably be stuck using this Linux variant until then. At least it works.

I can tell when the browser ceases to function too; it will start giving me the "Waiting for reply" deal with every single website I encounter, and it won't let me terminate the process (like other users have reported).

I really am stumped. I have nothing else that can be causing this; it's just the factory install, nothing else.
 
Hello,

I joined up after reading this thread. I've been experiencing the same issue as other here and thought I would share my situation.

First my PC:
Dell XPS 630i
4GB RAM
GeForce GTX 280 (1GB Video RAM)
Windows Vistaâ„¢ Home Premium (6.0, Build 6001) Service Pack 1
NVIDIA nForce 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet

Second me:
I am a network engineer by trade, specializing in Cisco gear, but I am a bit rusty on the windows side, having not supported it for 7-8 years now. I do however have a very good understanding of the networking side of things, even if I don't know specifically what's under Vista's hood (does anyone?)

I bought the PC at the first of the year, had it about 2 weeks and the HD crashed. On the new HD I loaded Vista, updated all hardware drivers, and loaded Microsoft updates.

Almost immediately the issues started. I'll be browsing, and then connections begin timing out. I have verified that this only seems to effect port 80, and it does not matter what browsing platform I use (EI/FF/Safari). To drive that point home I play a game called Eve Online. It has a web browser inside the game which is NOT an IE wrapper. It is a scratch built implementation, It stops working too, even though I remain in the game.


As others I have verified that non-port 80 TCP/UDP, and ICMP requests work fine. I have a lab with Linux and windows machines, as well as my wife running a business out of the house, and 2 teenagers with their own computers and an XBox. This only effects me.


Since I am connected to a Cisco switch, I have port level diagnostics. They show nothing. Windows event viewer shows nothing.

I would also like to point out that I have never had Zone Alarm loaded and this started before I loaded any anti-Virus software. I did load Malewarebytes' Anti-Maleware as a troubleshooting step as suggested on another forum AFTER the issue started.


Also I can make this problem happen at will. All I need to do is fire up Google maps and start scrolling around. After about 5 minutes I'm done every time. I can also do this by opening a lot of tabs at once in my browser. This suggests to me a limitation in the number of IP connections Vista allows while at the same time neglecting to release unused ones. That's just a guess though, and I'm not sure something like that would be based on ports.


Sorry to say, I have no solutions to offer, just more symptoms.


Finally , it is very interesting to me that a simple Google search shows this to a wide-spread problem that has been going on well over a year, and there is no fix or even acknowledgment from Microsoft on the issue. Having suffered through MS products since MSDOS version 1.x, I don't want to hear that the next version will fix it! Yet I have a funny feeling that will be the 'fix', at least it will be until we make the actual purchase, then the next version will fix everything......
 
"a while


Hi! Dell Technical Support has an article out dated 3/27/2009 Number 355814 "Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 in Windows Vista and XP Trouble Shooting Notes. They also have a very extensive forum on "Browser Crashes" and "Diagnostics". I don't know, have you checked any of those out yet ?
 
Hmmmm since you guys do not have ZA seems it is a different problem.
It does not inspire current Vista users with much confidence that issues such as these ar being resolved when Windows 7 is soon to be released.....................:frown:
 
Re: "a while

Hi! Dell Technical Support has an article out dated 3/27/2009 Number 355814 "Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 in Windows Vista and XP Trouble Shooting Notes. They also have a very extensive forum on "Browser Crashes" and "Diagnostics". I don't know, have you checked any of those out yet ?

I will check into that myself, a link would be handy, though I'm going to google it anyway.
Thanks.
 
Re: "a while

Hi! Dell Technical Support has an article out dated 3/27/2009 Number 355814 "Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 in Windows Vista and XP Trouble Shooting Notes. They also have a very extensive forum on "Browser Crashes" and "Diagnostics". I don't know, have you checked any of those out yet ?

Thanks!, I'll check that out and see if Dell can help me with my Microsoft Windows Vista problem. I'll report back with results.
 
I'm searching the data base: This came up- Link Removed - Invalid URL (Firefox crashes (This is strange- go into this forum, skip it then hit the "SUPPORT BUTTON" When you get to the suppport page code in "BROWSER CRASHES" in their search window) It should bring up pages of browser problems... Forums - DELL COMMUNITY
 
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