Steam Client Troubles

[thesilentman]

Since school's off today, I decided to take it easy today and play some games with my friends. So I fire up Steam. Steam starts an update. The progress bar hits 90% and BAM, it says I'm not online.

Nice try, Steam, but when I'm playing a game of blitz online as you're updating and you tell me that I'm not online, I don't know what to say.

I've tried everything I could think of, ranging from reinstalling Steam (multiple times) to mucking about with compatibility settings (I'm running Windows 8 Pro, and Steam worked just fine under it until today). I've ran CCleaner, made sure that there's no viruses, defragmenting my HDD, the whole shebang.

Anyone know what could be my problem? I'm not going to mess around with the registry or my network settings as I'm a bit too afraid of majorly fucking anything up, and because I won't know what happens if I start entering random commands in Windows.

Thanks for taking the time to read about my issue, and for any help that you guys may be able to give.

 

[SnowyGamester]

Did you check whether it's allowed in the firewall?

 

[thesilentman]

Did you check whether it's allowed in the firewall?

Not sure how to do that. :-/ How do you do that?

 

[SnowyGamester]

Depends. If you're just using the built-in Windows firewall you head to the control panel, select Windows firewall, and assuming you're using Vista or above (I think) there will be an option to the left that says 'Allow an app or feature through Windows Firewall'. Find Steam in the list and tick the boxes to let it through. If you're using a different firewall then it will be different, chances are there will be an icon in the system tray for your firewall or security suite - right click it, open it up and find the list of allowed programs and add Steam or tick it if it's already there. If you're using the built-in firewall on XP then it should be basically the same process though the exact wording and layouts may be different, I can't remember exactly how it is.

 

[thesilentman]

Depends. If you're just using the built-in Windows firewall you head to the control panel, select Windows firewall, and assuming you're using Vista or above (I think) there will be an option to the left that says 'Allow an app or feature through Windows Firewall'. Find Steam in the list and tick the boxes to let it through. If you're using a different firewall then it will be different, chances are there will be an icon in the system tray for your firewall or security suite - right click it, open it up and find the list of allowed programs and add Steam or tick it if it's already there. If you're using the built-in firewall on XP then it should be basically the same process though the exact wording and layouts may be different, I can't remember exactly how it is.

HOLY HELL MAN. THANKS! :-D

You have no idea how happy I am. Once again, thanks. I'm actually kicking myself at how easy it was.

I seriously cannot thank you enough.

 

[SnowyGamester]

I am the master.
capcha: and that's the way it is

 

[thesilentman]

I am the master.
capcha: and that's the way it is

...And dammit. It stopped working again. :-( What now?

 

[SnowyGamester]

Hmm...must be something else then. Did you install anything or change anything the day it stopped working properly? Perhaps do a system restore to back before it broke. You could also try someone else's internet connection or another computer on yours if possible - that should rule out any router or ISP blocking issues. Also, when you reinstalled Steam, did you uninstall it and delete everything in the Steam folder first? There might still be something broken in there. Try deleting ClientRegistry.blob and restarting Steam, that may also fix it.

 

[thesilentman]

Hmm...must be something else then. Did you install anything or change anything the day it stopped working properly? Perhaps do a system restore to back before it broke. You could also try someone else's internet connection or another computer on yours if possible - that should rule out any router or ISP blocking issues. Also, when you reinstalled Steam, did you uninstall it and delete everything in the Steam folder first? There might still be something broken in there. Try deleting ClientRegistry.blob and restarting Steam, that may also fix it.

All of that is not working. I'm still getting the same error, and now I have 5 entries of Steam in the firewall.

Hmmm, how do I refresh the network settings? I may need to fully scrub out any traces of Steam, then retry. It might be my network settings, or my proxy, which I only use when I need to be really anonymous.

 

[thesilentman]

Hmm...must be something else then. Did you install anything or change anything the day it stopped working properly? Perhaps do a system restore to back before it broke. You could also try someone else's internet connection or another computer on yours if possible - that should rule out any router or ISP blocking issues. Also, when you reinstalled Steam, did you uninstall it and delete everything in the Steam folder first? There might still be something broken in there. Try deleting ClientRegistry.blob and restarting Steam, that may also fix it.

Sorry to quote you again. But I may have fixed it. I think it was a combination of all of those steps along with installing Steam through a proxy. I have no idea why that worked, but it did. :-D

Thanks man, and we can finally close the chapter on this. Sorry if I kept you here for too long.

 

[Axzarious]

I myself have an ongoing problem with steam with the same issues as you, yet I have no idea how to fix it. I am going to try what is listed here, but I don't use windows firewall, and my current firewall has had no problems with STEAM before.
I do however know that these problems started with the relatively recent update that enabled STEAM to run on Linux.