What the ... Firefox

[OldGuy]

Downloaded the FireFox installer to a laptop with no FireFox.
Got it from Mozilla (I thought). Offered "Driver Support" and since
Mozilla, I accepted.
Did I go to the wrong website.
Driver Support says almost every driver on my laptop is out of date. I
did not "Fix It".
Yes, it is an old XP Pro install but ... all updates installed or so I
thought.

Went back to another Mozilla download site and it says I have the
latest FireFox installed. I was going there using Pale Moon.
Yet FireFox does not appear in the start menu (yes, I sorted it.

Confused. What's up?

 

[Paul]

Downloaded the FireFox installer to a laptop with no FireFox.
Got it from Mozilla (I thought). Offered "Driver Support" and since
Mozilla, I accepted.
Did I go to the wrong website.
Driver Support says almost every driver on my laptop is out of date. I
did not "Fix It".
Yes, it is an old XP Pro install but ... all updates installed or so I
thought.

Went back to another Mozilla download site and it says I have the latest
FireFox installed. I was going there using Pale Moon.
Yet FireFox does not appear in the start menu (yes, I sorted it.

Confused. What's up?

Are you a practitioner of the ancient art of Safe Hex ?

*******

Using Wikipedia, we look for an article on Firefox.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox

Sez there, "Website mozilla.org/firefox"

So we go to

http://www.mozilla.org/firefox

That link will automatically direct you here.

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/

Now, how that link works, is it uses mirror sites. (Or at
least in the past it has.) And servers other than the main mozilla
server can deliver the file to you. But the process is seamless
and there is nothing to fiddle with.

Even if they deliver a stub installer to you, eventually
you get your file.

Mozilla.org is not known to be an adware site. Any mirror adding
adware to the download, would be "kicked out" of the rotation.

*******

For more casual dining, you can browse their FTP server.

The FTP site has README files, and they don't really want
end-user distribution done with just any of their servers.
But when I need an old version, I look in here as a starting point.

ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/README

ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/32.0b6/win32/en-US/

You will notice there, you get a *full* installer, not a
stub. You take the Firefox Setup 32.0b6.exe file with you,
if you're going to a friends house, with the objective
of giving them a whole copy. And the size is about right.

Firefox Setup 32.0b6.exe 34427 KB

*******

You can go to your Downloads menu and copy the link used to
do the download. And from that, perhaps you can figure out
what site you visited. Browsers also have History menus
which allow reconstruction of your browsing activities.

Sites can get hacked, but what you got wasn't malware,
so instead it suggests you went "down a dark alley" by accident.
And got mugged.

HTH,
Paul

 

[BillW50]

Downloaded the FireFox installer to a laptop with no FireFox.
Got it from Mozilla (I thought). Offered "Driver Support" and since
Mozilla, I accepted.
Did I go to the wrong website.
Driver Support says almost every driver on my laptop is out of date. I
did not "Fix It".
Yes, it is an old XP Pro install but ... all updates installed or so I
thought.

Went back to another Mozilla download site and it says I have the latest
FireFox installed. I was going there using Pale Moon.
Yet FireFox does not appear in the start menu (yes, I sorted it.

Confused. What's up?

Pale Moon is based on Firefox's source code. So Mozilla thinks you are
already running Firefox doesn't surprise me.

Downloading one of those driver update checker as annoying malware
sounds like you clicked on an ad instead of the real download link. They
can be tricky so check very carefully before clicking. But I don't think
Mozilla has any ads anyway on their servers.

Restoring from an earlier backup would be the best then to do to get rid
of it. If you don't have one, I would create one now. Then try System
Restore if that will work or try to uninstall it.

 

[OldGuy]

That is why I mentioned Pale Moon, since I thought that might be the
case.

Went to Mozilla and did a Fresh Download that downloaded the 30 MB
FireFox inclusive and installed that.

Running Malwarebytes and Spybot to detect ???

============================================================
Any knowledge of the following?

The Drive Support About menu drops down to show:
_______________________________________________________________
Driver Support Version: 9.1.4.4

Machine Identifier: 78747000-4b27-41a2-b906-14583e1d37a5

External Libraries and Contributors
=====================================
Pie Chart

 

[Paul]

That is why I mentioned Pale Moon, since I thought that might be the case.

Went to Mozilla and did a Fresh Download that downloaded the 30 MB
FireFox inclusive and installed that.

Running Malwarebytes and Spybot to detect ???

============================================================
Any knowledge of the following?

The Drive Support About menu drops down to show:
_______________________________________________________________
Driver Support Version: 9.1.4.4

Machine Identifier: 78747000-4b27-41a2-b906-14583e1d37a5

External Libraries and Contributors
=====================================
Pie Chart
----------------------------
Julijan Sribar l-)
http://www.codeproject.com/csharp/julijanpiechart.asp

Animated Loading Circle

This is a scan of the "Firefox Setup 32.0b6.exe" file. 35,252,544 bytes.
It's clean.

https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/...309017387317b5065b06c60eb4c19e12b12/analysis/

*******

This is an example of a "driversupport.exe" program.

http://www.herdprotect.com/driversupport.exe-a7a82282ca086d46b1ccd9119054d545027a5efb.aspx

"Driver Support by PC Drivers HeadQuarters, Inc
This is a re-labeled version of the company's Driver Detective software.
www.driversupport.com
55% remove it
"

I guess "the other 45% died trying"

*******

Some users comment on the removal of Driver Detective. It seems
the company likes to change the program name, as it is also
called "Driver Manager".

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...etective/c396d987-ad92-45ca-90b3-18fdecd60f83

Paul

 

[Mayayana]

| Pale Moon is based on Firefox's source code. So Mozilla thinks you are
| already running Firefox doesn't surprise me.
|

I don't think that would happen. I use both. They are
pretty much the same thing, but their installs are entirely
separate. Separate Program Files folder. Separate App
Data folder. Separate Registry settings.

 

[BillW50]

| Pale Moon is based on Firefox's source code. So Mozilla thinks you are
| already running Firefox doesn't surprise me.
|

I don't think that would happen. I use both. They are
pretty much the same thing, but their installs are entirely
separate. Separate Program Files folder. Separate App
Data folder. Separate Registry settings.

We were not speaking of the installer, but what Mozilla's website saw
the OP was using. And it wouldn't surprise me if Mozilla considers Pale
Moon the same as Firefox.

 

[Mayayana]

| > | Pale Moon is based on Firefox's source code. So Mozilla thinks you are
| > | already running Firefox doesn't surprise me.
| > |
| >
| > I don't think that would happen. I use both. They are
| > pretty much the same thing, but their installs are entirely
| > separate. Separate Program Files folder. Separate App
| > Data folder. Separate Registry settings.
|
| We were not speaking of the installer, but what Mozilla's website saw
| the OP was using. And it wouldn't surprise me if Mozilla considers Pale
| Moon the same as Firefox.
|

I see. But there's no reason for the Mozilla site to be
"sniffing" the version in the first place. And even if they
did in the case of some sort of online installer, the
method to check would be through the userAgent
string. PM has its own userAgent string.

(Is there an online installer for FF? I've never seen
such a thing, but I don't enable javascript and for me
Mozilla.org/com is a singularly messed up website. It
always takes me a few minutes to actually hunt down
the download links. So if they have an option to download
a stub installer I might have missed it.)

It sounds to me like we're not getting the whole story.
He's not sure if he got it from Mozilla. He's not sure if
FF is installed. And whatever site he's going to now doesn't
want to give him a FF installer. None of it makes any sense.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Downloaded the FireFox installer to a laptop with no FireFox.
Got it from Mozilla (I thought). Offered "Driver Support" and since
Mozilla, I accepted.

I suspect you _didn't_ get it from Mozilla.

Did I go to the wrong website.
Driver Support says almost every driver on my laptop is out of date. I
did not "Fix It".

[]
Get rid of Driver Support if you can. Assuming all hardware on the
laptop is running OK, there's no reason to change the drivers, whether
"out of date" or not. Changing drivers unnecessarily is usually to be
avoided.

You were wise not to click Fix It.