I've seen Firefox's annoying automatic update referenced several time in the forums. Older versions had a checkbox to disable it, but Mozilla, like many other software companies, has decided that they know what's best for their users. I personally find this offensive since my experience has been that updates often either fail to work at all or break other programs or functions.
End of tirade
Here is a way to disable the auto update that works for me:
If you do want to do an update, just remove or rename the distribution directory.
wizard