Firefox 7.0.1, and connection problems.

On my computer, it seems that whenever I run Mozilla Firefox, 7.0.1 to be precise, it starts up perfectly...then at what I can only assume are random bursts, it will either start or stop connecting to pages.

This is difficult to explain, but when these..."attacks", if you will, occur, then Firefox cannot connect to a single page; it will stay stuck on the "Loading..." animation for new tabs, pages already opened won't load any further, I cannot navigate to a new page, and pages that were loading when this occurs stop loading, providing a skeleton of what the page is supposed to be. Unusually, no error messages of any type ever appear; the pages remain blank or stuck on the page that they originally were on.

This problem comes at random; sometimes I can browse for hours on end before the thing self destructs, while in others, it starts when Firefox opens.

This bug sometimes fixes itself; the time required, however, has varied from only a few seconds to a day later.

Despite attempts to do so, altering options within Firefox do not end the problem; changing proxy settings, options within about:config (specifically, altering boolean properties and strings about the DNS and IPv6), disabling add-ons/extensions and even Safe Mode don't stop this problem from coming along. Uninstalling Firefox via Control Panel and reinstalling had no effect whatsoever.

My Antivirus programs consist of Avast!, PC Tools Antivirus, and ThreatFire; disabling all three at the same time does not solve the problem (as Firefox can sometimes connect when the three are on, I have doubts they are resposible).

This is not the first time Firefox has done this; I recall this problem occuring on Firefox 6 as well, albeit much less frequently.

My internet connection (I am using a wireless connection at the moment), at the present, works perfectly; Opera, Chrome and IE work perfectly on this computer, and in the months since this problem has occured, Chrome has worked flawlessly, never dropping off connections. Other applications that require internet access, such as Steam, the Last.fm Audioscrobbler and Google's MusicManager also all work perfectly.

I think that's all. Thanks for reading. If I need to provide something more, let me know.

BleepingComputer.com: Firefox 7.0.1, and connection problems.