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Steam Csd Csm Extract Download Them Again

Im drowning in my game backlog Is there any way to back up Steam games without waiting forever to download them again Thomas S.

Steam packs a lot of useful features into its client software, including game backups, although you can always do it yourself once you know where Valve buries the bodies during installation.

Official client backups begin on the Steam menu via the library view.

Select Backup and Restore and pick Backup currently installed programs from the next dialog.

Youll be presented with a window that lists all of your installed Steam software.

Right clicking installed games directly from the library listing also works; just select Backup Game File as a shortcut.

Use shift or control for multiple selection with this method.

In addition to picking a device with sufficient remaining space, keep in mind some older file systems such as Fat32 have inherent file size limitations (4GB, in Fat32s case).

Consider converting these devices to newer file systems such as NTFS when possible.

Modern file systems have plenty of advantages beyond big backups.

Archive processing takes about a minute or two per gigabyte depending on the system and the files being compressed.

Once finished youll be presented with the option of opening the backup folder and given basic instructions on restoration.

Select Restore a previous program from the Steam menu Backup and Restore Games option, and select the folder where the backup was stored.

Steam validates backups, a process that frequently takes as long as compressing the files in the first place, so be patient for larger games.

If the wait to compress backups and validate them later bothers you, theres an alternative worth considering.

Steam stores game files in a subfolder thats user accessible, although the default location is buried a few layers deep in C:Program Files (x86)SteamSteamAppscommon.

Steam Csd Csm Extract Archive Device Directly

If you dont mind giving up disk space for speed and easy access, you can simply copy the entire game folder to an archive device directly.

This skips the compression and validation process entirely although the restoration process is less guided than Steams built-in feature.

If you intend to remove the games after backup, do this via Steams Delete Local Content option rather than deleting them on the desktop.

Discovering local files To restore games backed up this way, delete any damaged preexisting installs and copy the folder back to its original location.

Select Install from the games library entry, and Steam will discover all local files, download updates, and restore it to working order quicker than a standard backup and in a fraction of the time required for full download.