User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:79.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/79.0

Steps to reproduce:

Updated from TB 68 to TB 78.1.0 and 78.1.1

Actual results:

I am on the Release channel, and Thunderbird notified me of the update, which may be contrary to others who were updated through Kaspersky or other service.

TB frequently and repeatedly becomes unresponsive for up to 3 minutes before returning control. During this time the processing wheel is turning.

This appears to be isolated to TB, as I can do anything else with any other program or the desktop during this period. The Task Manager reports no abnormal CPU /Memory activity or unexpected app activity.

So far it is merely an interrupting annoyance that I would otherwise use to check email, .......

Note- Using V78.1.0 HAVE NOT tried it on 78.1.1

Thanks for reporting this.

1. Where precisely, and if you can remember, with what wording, did Thunderbird tell you an update is available?
2. Does Windows safe mode help your performance issue? - win10 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/12376/windows-10-start-your-pc-in-safe-mode

1. A typical popup appeared over the TB window saying that an update was available and asked to download it. (I've opted for "Check for Updates but let me choose to install")
2. I will try safe mode and report back

Thank you

Thanks.

Just to be clear, "I am on the Release channel, and Thunderbird notified me of the update," means thunderbird updated you from 68 to 78? Or did you get on 78 by downloading? If the former, please check Help > Troubleshooting > Update history - please screen shot that and use "attach new file" to the bug report (please no documents or zip files).

68 to 78 update history

A typical popup appeared over the TB window saying that an update was available and asked me to download it, which I did. (I've opted for "Check for Updates but let me choose to install")

check out comment 5

I got the same update offer on my laptop running TB 68. I didn't take the bait.

I tried Windows Safe Mode and Safe mode with Networking as Wayne advised in Comment 2. I did not see the hanging behavior in either mode. However it's been two days since returning to normal mode, and it has not happened.

(In reply to Wayne Mery (:wsmwk) from comment #7)

check out comment 5

another possibility is bug 1653558 comment 27

I don't have any further insight. Potentially a bug in the Mozilla Maintenance Service then: https://searchfox.org/comm-central/source/mozilla/toolkit/mozapps/update/UpdateService.jsm
Alternatively some external software updater interacting with that. I don't know to what level they integrate with it.

TB got hung up several times today. Twice while composing messages and once when closing a received message. The longest hang was 1m 25secs. I have not seen it hang (as I had before) while just browsing the inbox.
I've not made any changes to my system since trying Safe Mode.

Update- It hung several times yesterday and today. Once I simply moved the cursor over the Inbox window. Other times a mouse click will trigger it. It can take more than 2 minutes to recover.

I have been trying (again) to replicate the unwanted update bug.
The update server is sending back the correct data: no update past 68.11.0 when running a version < 78.0.
So there is something else happening that we're not seeing.

I apologize to the community for apparently combining two issues. My main concern is the frequent periods of unresponsiveness.
I can confirm with reasonably high confidence that It is not related to checking for new mail.

I am wondering of uninstalling and reinstalling the program might help. Can that be done without losing the profile, folder structure, and messages?

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-thunderbird-stores-user-data should give you some reassurance about reinstalling the program.

TB frequently and repeatedly becomes unresponsive for up to 3 minutes before returning control. During this time the processing wheel is turning.

Let's see how 78.2.0 does for you https://archive.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/candidates/78.2.0-candidates/build1/win32/en-US/Thunderbird%20Setup%2078.2.0.exe

I installed 78.2.0 a couple of days ago. So far, So good! No events of freezing up as yet.
Thank you !

Thanks.