AfterDawn: News

Mozilla kills off 64-bit Firefox

Mozilla has killed the 64-bit version of Firefox before it ever became widely available.

Engineering Manager Benjamin Smedberg posted the decision in a discussion thread titled "Turning off win64 builds."



Smedberg did post the reasons, with most making sense (via TNW):

Many plugins are not available in 64-bit versions.
The plugins that are available don't work correctly in Firefox because we haven't implemented things like windowproc hooking, which means that hangs are more common.
Crashes submitted by 64-bit users are currently not high priority because we are working on other things.
This is frustrating for users because they feel (and are!) second-class.
It is also frustrating for stability team triage because crash-stats does not easily distinguish between 32-bit and 64-bit builds in the topcrash lists and other reports. We basically ignore a set of nightly "topcrashes" because they are 64-bit only. (See bug 811051).

The engineer did note that 50 percent of all the nightly build testers were using the 64-bit builds, so the new decision will likely anger at least some developers and fans.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 23 Nov 2012 1:44

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• 14 comments

• Semperfipal

  What about Waterfox? Its a 64 bit browser. Is is not associated with Mozilla Firefox? It appears to be.
  

  "Do not underestimate the power of an enemy, no matter how great or small, to rise against you another day." - Atilla

  23.11.2012 09:01 #1

• KillerBug

  I'm sure FF64 will be back at some point in the future, but right now it is hardly a loss...I rarely have enough going in FF to use even 1GB of memory anyway.
  

  
  

  23.11.2012 09:42 #2

• scyeffect

  FF is really a RAM killer. always make my laptop lagging. but i must use it to develope my site

  23.11.2012 09:52 #3

• A5J4DX

  FF is a ram killer i have 8gb and it goes past 1gb at times but yeah itll be back...
  

  23.11.2012 10:49 #4

• scorpNZ

  Yeah waterfox is using 500mb with only two tabs open,must be the plugins n stuff
  

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  23.11.2012 12:05 #5

• aldan

  while my computer isnt new it isnt any slouch either and ive had a myriad of issues with firefox.ive stuck with firefox for years and the one time ive used chrome i was not impressed.well guess what.intstalled chrome about a month ago and stuck it out and got used to it.it will take a lot to get me to use firefox again.
  

  23.11.2012 14:26 #6

• Mysttic

  I too switched to chrome, as firefox even 32bit version was getting annoying with flash plug-ins etc. I realize that Adobe could be in part to blame, but I haven't experienced the same issues on either Chrome or IE 64bit. Still I haven't seen a perfect running browser in quite some time, they all have their issues so really I have to agree that this is no loss.

  23.11.2012 17:04 #7

• thebox

  I had to switch to FF recently because Chrome isnt 64bit and since the new Java update, some of my live chat tech sites only work with 64bit browsers. This is gonna suck major time for me.
  

  ahhhhh!!! cobras

  24.11.2012 09:23 #8

• ZippyDSM

  Water fox FTW!!!!!!!!!!! A shame FF is the least efficient browser these days ;_;
  

  Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Lets renegotiate them.
  
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  24.11.2012 10:39 #9

• DXR88

  Ever since i started using SeaMonkey 4 years ago i haven't even bothered with another browser.
  

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  24.11.2012 15:16 #10

• aldan

  Originally posted by DXR88: Ever since i started using SeaMonkey 4 years ago i haven't even bothered with another browser. havent looked at that one.i will check it out.
  

  24.11.2012 16:56 #11

• xtago

  I like opera.
  
  The people who are running FF are putting it into the ground the updates just kill so many plugins and by the time the plugins are updated the next version of FF is out.
  
  I never really understood what the overall point of going to version 17 the beat is version 17b15 it gets updated almost 2-3 times a week.
  
  I used the beta version of firefox last beta was crashing a fair bit after the last 2 updates it's not so bad, no plug in works on the beta it's updated way too much for that to happen, and the spell check update is utter crap chrome flogs it.
  
  I guess they have stopped this so they can push out their firefox mobile OS out the door.
  
  I do think fire fox has gone downhill for a real long time.

  24.11.2012 20:36 #12

• hearme0

  Mozilla killing it off likely BECAUSE Waterfox is better and 100 percent compatible with ALL plugins.
  
  Waterfox rocks!

  25.11.2012 23:37 #13

• kfkilci

  Seems like a clever decision...
  
  What I want from developers of Firefox is this:
  Pls develop FF 32 bit to its maturity ASAP...
  Yes you have surpassed IE in version numbers (FF: 17 vs IE:9... :) ), but it is just that nothing more...
  
  Waterfox is, on the other hand, good enough for me as a 64 bit browser to do whatever I want...

  26.11.2012 07:51 #14