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I'm in the same boat. Steam was DESTROYING my PC for a long time. I couldn't figure out what it was and finally tracked the random spikes and focus losses to

by zodPod 11y ago

I'm in the same boat. Steam was DESTROYING my PC for a long time. I couldn't figure out what it was and finally tracked the random spikes and focus losses to Steam's update service being corrupt. Re-installing Steam means uninstalling everything you've downloaded with steam, possibly losing save games and stuff like that, then having to wait for everything to re-download and install. There are ways around it, which I found later but I had already screwed up half of my downloaded games because I had assumed that I would be able to just do a uninstall-reinstall on it without losing all of my stuff. Total garbage. I will definitely not be using anything like steam, in the future, if I have any choice in the matter.

nitrogen 11y ago
You should have backed up your games first. That's pretty easy. You can even install steam into an existing library folder and it will find all the games.
mattmanser 11y ago
Sorry you got burned, but I installed a whole new primary drive and didn't have to reinstall all my games. There's also a backup feature that you didn't use. Games have also generally always put their saves in your documents folder. I appreciate it might have been an easy assumption to make, but it's even right there in google searches instant answer thing[1] so it must be a common question. It obviously caused you a lot of hassle but steam's wildly popular and mainly loved, not total garbage. I'm really only commentating to make it clear to non-steam users that this poster has a minority opinion on the service, it's been years since there was any wide user dissatisfaction in steam (mainly when it first came out). They even recently added a no-questions-asked refund system if you bought a game in the last 2 weeks and have played the game less than 2 hours[1]. [1]https://www.google.com/search?q=does+uninstalling+steam+delete+games https://www.google.com/search?q=does+uninstalling+steam+dele... [2]http://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/ http://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/
- slavik81 11y ago
  > Games have also generally always put their saves in your documents folder. Many games do, but there are still plenty that put them elsewhere. You probably want to use something like Gamesave Manager [1] to find them all. [1] http://www.gamesave-manager.com http://www.gamesave-manager.com
- tomc1985 11y ago
  Not to mention the steamapps folder is easily transferable (copy+paste)
ionised 11y ago
> Re-installing Steam means uninstalling everything you've downloaded with steam This is not true. Delete everything apart from the steamapps and userdata folders (which contain all your games and related data) and the Steam executable. Next time you click it it will redownload and install itself and all your installed games will be intact.

by zodPod 11y ago

nitrogen 11y ago

You should have backed up your games first. That's pretty easy. You can even install steam into an existing library folder and it will find all the games.

mattmanser 11y ago

Sorry you got burned, but I installed a whole new primary drive and didn't have to reinstall all my games. There's also a backup feature that you didn't use. Games have also generally always put their saves in your documents folder. I appreciate it might have been an easy assumption to make, but it's even right there in google searches instant answer thing[1] so it must be a common question. It obviously caused you a lot of hassle but steam's wildly popular and mainly loved, not total garbage. I'm really only commentating to make it clear to non-steam users that this poster has a minority opinion on the service, it's been years since there was any wide user dissatisfaction in steam (mainly when it first came out). They even recently added a no-questions-asked refund system if you bought a game in the last 2 weeks and have played the game less than 2 hours[1]. [1]https://www.google.com/search?q=does+uninstalling+steam+delete+games https://www.google.com/search?q=does+uninstalling+steam+dele... [2]http://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/ http://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/

slavik81 11y ago
> Games have also generally always put their saves in your documents folder. Many games do, but there are still plenty that put them elsewhere. You probably want to use something like Gamesave Manager [1] to find them all. [1] http://www.gamesave-manager.com http://www.gamesave-manager.com
tomc1985 11y ago
Not to mention the steamapps folder is easily transferable (copy+paste)

ionised 11y ago

> Re-installing Steam means uninstalling everything you've downloaded with steam This is not true. Delete everything apart from the steamapps and userdata folders (which contain all your games and related data) and the Steam executable. Next time you click it it will redownload and install itself and all your installed games will be intact.