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Firefox ignores my default name and gives me a stripped new version of FF

  • 2 replies
  • 3 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by cor-el

Noel8
Noel8
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I keep getting the message of "Firefox could not load profile or its not accessible". I go to my Profile.ini folder and all seems well there with my old default name that I want and yet if and when I am able to open FF, its just the new 'naked' version. This has been going on for days..very frustrating. I had the same situation with the AOL browser and it loaded just fine in less than 3 minutes.

I keep getting the message of "Firefox could not load profile or its not accessible". I go to my Profile.ini folder and all seems well there with my old default name that I want and yet if and when I am able to open FF, its just the new 'naked' version. This has been going on for days..very frustrating. I had the same situation with the AOL browser and it loaded just fine in less than 3 minutes.

All Replies (2)

John99
John99
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Hi Noel8
Sorry you are having problems.

I am wondering if you have accidentally used the wrong profile.

  • Presumably Firefox is working at the moment. You appear to be posting from Firefox. Can you confirm that?
  • Open about:addons do you see your installed themes ?
  • ( I am not suggesting you try a reset now. ) Have you done a reset?
    If so the old profile may now be unused and on your desktop with another profile installed, and in use.
  • Please could you try opening the troubleshooting info page ( about:support ) and then the profile from there. It is the easiest method of confirming which profile is actually in use. Looking at that information also helps you undrestand what which profile it is and what it has.

Any profiles will contain places.squlite a bookmarks and History database. Searching for that file will help you locate any profiles you have. The date and size of the file will give some indication of how and when that profile was used.

This article will help with information on transferring files if necessary

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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A possible/likely cause is a problem with the profiles.ini file and the profile marked as Default=1 in this file is no longer present on the hard drive.

  • Windows: %AppData%\Mozilla\Firefox\
    C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile>\

You can use one of these to make Firefox create/use a new default profile:

  • Delete the profiles.ini file to force Firefox to create a new default profile
  • Use the Profile Manager to create a new profile
  • Use "Choose Folder" when you create a new profile to select the location of a lost profile and recover this profile

If the new profile works then you can transfer files from a previously used profile to the new profile, but be cautious not to copy corrupted files to avoid carrying over the problem