The last steam update

[daver201]

...really messed up my computer. My computer was working fine til steam began its automatic update. Now everything steam related just locks up and won't load at all.

I am going to try and delete the ClientRegistry.blob file and see if that will fix things, otherwise I'll try and reinstall steam.

[JumpMasterG]

So are you saying don't load their friends/group thingy ma jiggy?!

[daver201]

jumpg said:

So are you saying don't load their friends/group thingy ma jiggy?!

I don't even know what you're talking about there. lol

All I know is the last update for steam is causing me trouble. I haven't been able to get on for a couple days now. I deleted the ClientRegistry.blob file, and tried to load steam again. Didn't work. I backed up all my dod files to another location and then went into control panel and removed steam from the add/remove software area.

I completely wiped steam off my computer and downloaded it again. It installed fine, but when I try to connect to steam, it freezes up now. My CPU useage jumps to about 50%, which is the max since I am using a hyperthreaded cpu.

Nothing else on my computer is effected, just steam locks up. I guess I'll do some research....

[Beek]

I think trin was having the same problem, so if you find a fix she might appreciate it.

[Trinity]

I have a support ticket in on this matter but found that if you shut off the new crap they added I can actually play. But if you shut off the community thing you wont have a friends list, not sure if chatting is posible either.

[daver201]

trinity said:

I have a support ticket in on this matter but found that if you shut off the new crap they added I can actually play. But if you shut off the community thing you wont have a friends list, not sure if chatting is posible either.

Thanks for the tip. I'm not able able to select anything though to shut off. When I click on the steam icon on my desktop, it starts to load, and logs in using my account name, but then I get a frozen window. I cannot select anything on it by right or left clicking. Steam is just completely frozen, and my cpu usage is maxed out.

So far, I have removed steam completely. I then used a registry cleaner and removed any mention of valve or steam, and checked for any other registry errors. I used another cleanup program for temp files, etc. I checked all my device drivers and found nothing wrong. I installed steam again, and it just locks up. I'll have to play around with it some more tomorrow, when I am done with work.

[daver201]

I still cannot get on yet. Not sure why, I installed it on my laptop and there is no problem there. It makes it hard to work on the server, because I cannot log into it with steam and test things out. My last option would be to reinstall windows.

[profbuldge]

It has nothing to do with Windows. Most likely it means that your PC's resources are being overtaxed. This new update (at least from what I can gather) uses more memory to run.

I haven't found much help on the issue but my questions to you are:
What Operating System are you running?
How much RAM do you have installed?
Do you have any background applications running?

Start the Task Manager (ctrl + alt + del) and kill any programs that are running, then click on the Processes tab and if anything jumps out at you as not needing to be running kill it.

See if that works, if you need more info just let me know.

[daver201]

Well I think it is working now, and I didn't have to do a reinstall of windows. Only time will tell for sure. It sure did look like my system was being overtaxed, with cpu usage maxed out, but just running steam itself is not very demanding at all. I also have XP SP2 running on an Asus P4P800 board, P2.4C overclocked to 3.0 with 1GB of Mushkin DDR400 (2-2-2-5) ram. Yes, I know it's an old computer. I built it myself a few years ago, but it serves me well still. I just can't play the latest games on it, but that's ok.

I am still not sure what the problem was, but I was watching the steam processes and my firewall (Sygate) connections, and steam was doing some kind of slow update. The initial steam update, and steam platform update went very fast, but there was something else going on in the background. That was what was causing steam to seem like it was frozen. It was using up all my cpu cycles.

I can normally download files at 700+ KB/sec on cable, but this update was happening around 300 bytes/sec. There was no indication from steam that it was updating anything, other than looking at my firewall packets and processes. So, I just let it do its thing, and well over an hour later, everything was finished and it is working fine. Fingers are crossed that is stays that way.

[daver201]

I might not be on for awhile. I can't get into steam at all. It is still locking up. There was a new update on the 17th to it as well. I thought that update might fix it, but it didn't. I managed to get into the game once, but then my cpu usage skyrocketed and the game stuttered so badly that is was virtually unplayable. My cpu usage is locked at 50%, which is the max that is allowed since the cpu is hyperthreaded.

My system should be more than fine to handle this, but something is causing a problem. I am not sure what. It works fine on my notebook, and all my friends who have steam have reported no problems with it. And my computer is faster than what some of those guys are using.

So I guess I'll try reinstalling windows xp again, and see if that will fix it. I might have some corrupted file somewhere, and a clean install might do me some good. I have been wanting to put the latest Ubuntu release on here as well, so I guess this will be a good time to reinstall everything into a dual boot config.

[Beek]

I had a similar problem on my old system. When I had any of the steam screens up my cpu would be 80-100%. It would run fine if steam was minimized down in the tray. Basically I would start steam launch the game then minimize steam.

Funny I don't have this issue on my new system.

[daver201]

80-100% is quite a bit. I don't think I ever seen mine go up above 10% before that update.

I cannot even minimize steam to reduce the workload. As soon as I open steam, it just freezes up and I cannot do a thing with it.

[Trinity]

OK I received an email back from Steam about the issues I had.
Here is what they said do (ready to laugh?)
--------------------------------------------------------------
What I sent in :
I havent been able to play Day of Defeat ever since the update which encluded the new community thing.
I can open steam and look at all the pages on it but when I click launch Day of Defeat it starts to load the page where you can get into option frinds list ect. but then shuts off and Im back at the steam page with the list of games.
Any help on this matter would be great!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What they replied with:

Response (Ricky) 09/19/2007 11:26 AM
Hello,

Please follow the link below for more information:

Title: Troubleshooting Game Crashes
URL: support.steampowered.com/cgi-bin/steampowered.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=397&p_created=1127526153


If you have any further questions, please let us know.
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Now mind you I went there first and tried all that before I sent in the CS ticket to support.

But hey since I shut off the community thing I have been able to play.

This info might help others out though

[daver201]

Thanks trinity. I looked at all that before too, and it didn't help. I will have to reinstall windows I think, but haven't had the time lately to mess around with it. I am currently remodelling a room here, and I started dating a new girlfriend at the beginning of this month which is taking up a lot of time for the moment.

[JumpMasterG]

How's your system now Dave?