When I go to move more than just a handful of bookmarks, I have the Windows Task Manager open and keep an eye on the Performance tab and the CPU display that appears in the System Tray. When the CPU meter pegs, I wait until Firefox digests the changes I made and then proceed to rearrange more once the CPU Usage drops back to a normal range.

OK - well, yes; that definitely was part of it ....

When I move even *one* bookmark, the CPU jumps to 25-40 percent; then, 5-8 seconds later, it drops down to 3-5 percent.

So, now that it's identified -- how do we fix that :) -- I'm used to moving bookmarks around quite a bit; this is now cumbersome ...... And, as I mentioned, it's a new development (only in the past; oh; month or so ....)

It looks like my best option will be to downgrade to an earlier version of FF, when I didn't have these problems (like 32-ish ...) -- or, switch to Chrome (which I'm less excited about).

Do what you gotta do, but I have seen that problem since the places.sqlite database setup was instituted in Firefox 3.0 back in June 2008. IMO, you might be having more issues due to your bookmarks collection having gotten larger over the years. For me the "breaking point" seems to have been in the 2000 to 2500 bookmarks saved range. Now-a-days I run multiple different Profiles and manage to keep my bookmarks collection small enough for the lag not to be too noticeable any longer.

Nope - I think I've identified the problem ... now, we can try and figure it out.

It's NOT the newer version of FF causing the problem; I think it's the FF Sync (before, I was using X-Marks, and that only synced when closing down the browser; with FF Synch, *every* change I make triggers the Sync action (which is what's making the CPU spike).

So - I can either dump the Sync function (and go back to X-Marks) or figure out how to set it so it only Syncs when the browser closes; or reduce the memory to it.

I tried to set it up so the Sync only happens every hour; but that's the redundancy -- the norm is *anytime* you do something that should be synced (like, moving a bookmark), sync activates.

Oh, you're using Sync. Yep, with every change to bookmarks sync will send the changes to the Sync Service - that will make things verrry slow.

IMO, turn off the "autoconnect" for at least as long as you are rearranging your bookmarks.

In about:config create a new Boolean pref named services.sync. autoconnect with a value of false.

Then use the Sync button to manually connect to the Sync service. The button is sitting in the Customize palette; just move it to a Toolbar or the Menu Panel so you can access it.

You can change that pref to True when you aren't rearranging bookmarks, but that pref will disappear - and you 'll have to create it the next time you want to turn off autoconnect.

You can check for problems with the places.sqlite database file in the Firefox profile folder.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmarks_history_and_toolbar_buttons_not_working_-_Firefox
• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Bookmarks+not+saved#w_fix-the-bookmarks-file

• Places Maintenance: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/places-maintenance/

Ed-Meister

I did what you suggested (set up a boolean called services.sync.autoconnect and false) - but when I move bookmarks, Sync still activates.

I have the button on the top toolbar; and I see it whirling around each time I move one.

I don't think I'd ever set it back to autoconnect; I'd rather simply sync when I want to (or, I can go back to using X-Marks) .... but, did I miss something in your instructions?

Looks like the services.sync.autoconnect option isn't supported any longer:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=641329

So - no more sync for me; back to X-Marks .... I can live with that; certainly better than moving to Chrome full-time ...

Thanks all!