Steam minimum requirements?

[xSOSxHawkens]

Hi,

I was wondering if someone can link me to an *official* source on the litteral *minimum* hardware requirements to install *just* the steam client and nothing more. Preferably for both windows and linux if possible.

There is some confusion over on C&H about what steam actually needs *just to launch*, and the listed minimums the OP has brought align with what Valve used to post on the /about/ page, but for the life of me I cannot find any updated lists of what the *client itself* requires to launch.

Issue is down to CPU support. Someone cant get it launched on a Core2Quad (which they should) and some people think it might be down to steam now *requiring* SSE4.x support (which kills off many Core2 and Phenom and ealier chips).

All of the minimum install lists online that you can find for steam only list the minimum as a Pentium 4 which lacks any type of SSE4.

Despite searching google allot, and on the main steam support database, I cannot find any definitive first part Valve provided listing of minimum install requirements for the client only that is more up to date than the Pentium 4 minimums.

At this point I just want a clear cut and accurate answer for my own personal curiosity.

So... What does it take to run steam and nothing else...

Can I still power up my mothballed Socket 478 rig and boot into windows 7 and load steam up like I was able to a year or so ago?...

[xSOSxHawkens]

Originally posted by Hahasack:

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4061-QUZB-4602

Ahh, yes, one of the listed pitfalls of a quick google search.

Assuming Valve labeled that correctly it is *NOT* the steam minimums...

Its the "Valve Index System Requirements"

And its vauge at best.

I am looking just the steam client, not the index system, and (hopefully) more specific than "quad core CPU"...

Something like the older list that has required minimum models from both AMD and Intel, or perhaps listed instruction set requirements.

[Marcnetismus]

Originally posted by xSOSxHawkens:

Originally posted by Hahasack:

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4061-QUZB-4602

Ahh, yes, one of the listed pitfalls of a quick google search.

Assuming Valve labeled that correctly it is *NOT* the steam minimums...

Its the "Valve Index System Requirements"

And its vauge at best.

I am looking just the steam client, not the index system, and (hopefully) more specific than "quad core CPU"...

Something like the older list that has required minimum models from both AMD and Intel, or perhaps listed instruction set requirements.

sorry my fault xD

[xSOSxHawkens]

Originally posted by Hahasack:

Originally posted by xSOSxHawkens:

Ahh, yes, one of the listed pitfalls of a quick google search.

Assuming Valve labeled that correctly it is *NOT* the steam minimums...

Its the "Valve Index System Requirements"

And its vauge at best.

I am looking just the steam client, not the index system, and (hopefully) more specific than "quad core CPU"...

Something like the older list that has required minimum models from both AMD and Intel, or perhaps listed instruction set requirements.

sorry my fault xD

No worries, its an easy pitfall I almost fell into before I noticed it too...

I just wish it were not so hard to get a simple answer for something so basic lol. Like every game on steam has the minimums listed... But not steam itself?... lol

[Marcnetismus]

Originally posted by xSOSxHawkens:

Originally posted by Hahasack:

sorry my fault xD

No worries, its an easy pitfall I almost fell into before I noticed it too...

I just wish it were not so hard to get a simple answer for something so basic lol. Like every game on steam has the minimums listed... But not steam itself?... lol

thank you for being so calm ... my time in germany is 3:46 am and i'm damn tired because i have been browsing community discussions for hours

[Kargor]

That's a weird question, considering that Steam doesn't do anything, and thus doesn't really have requirements.

Valve still hasn't bent to Microsoft, so Steam still runs on Win7. Beyond that... if you can run Win7 on it, Steam should run on it.

[xSOSxHawkens]

Originally posted by Kargor:

That's a weird question, considering that Steam doesn't do anything, and thus doesn't really have requirements.

Valve still hasn't bent to Microsoft, so Steam still runs on Win7. Beyond that... if you can run Win7 on it, Steam should run on it.

No, it def has minimum requirements...

Back before they killed off XP support I tried (around 2017) to install steam onto an XP instalation on a Pentium 233Mhz MMX with 256MB Ram to use it to play games such as Decent Freespace (a 9x era game that natively runs on said machine),

Back then, despite steam supporting XP, I was unble to install it b/c steam had already adopted the minimum of a Pentium 4, and assumably needed things like SSE instructions (or any instructions really) that the MMX Pentium lacked.

I would assume the same is true now. I have run windows 7 just fine on a pentium 3, but can a pentium 3 still launch steam.exe?...

Its just like any other PC software, it has a minimum list of things needed to execute, I just kinda want to know what it is...

[Cathulhu]

Steam does not require SSE4.
It does require a CPU supporting SSE2 instructions to be able to use all features of Steam:
https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4090-RTKZ-4347&l=
So, pretty much every CPU from within the last 20 years fits the bill.

[Washell]

It used to be on the same page where you download the client, but they changed that one completely. They weren't high, I do remember that. I think they removed it because most of the games have higher requirements anyway.

It's mostly Chromium, so you could look up the requirements for that.

[xSOSxHawkens]

Originally posted by Cathulhu:

Steam does not require SSE4.
It does require a CPU supporting SSE2 instructions to be able to use all features of Steam:
https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4090-RTKZ-4347&l=
So, pretty much every CPU from within the last 20 years fits the bill.

Thanks! So weird that its tossed hidden so deep in a knowledgebase :/

[Cathulhu]

To be fair, the requirements are so low, they don't really matter when even a Singlecore Pentium IV and Athlon 64 are able to meet those requirements.

[Sirap]

Originally posted by Cathulhu:

pretty much every CPU from within the last 20 years fits the bill.

Originally posted by Cathulhu:

even a Singlecore Pentium IV and Athlon 64 are able to meet those requirements.

These statements are demonstrably false.

The 64 bit Steam client requires the CMPXCHG16B instruction ever since 2015/2016 ( https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux/issues/7046 ), so it *can't* run on an Athlon 64 3700+ from 2006 which would otherwise be more than capable of running older games.

On Linux there is only a 64 bit client. On Windows 10 the actual 64 bit OS requires that instruction, but you can still get away with running it on Windows 10 32 bit on a CPU that lacks that instruction.

As can be seen in that GitHub issue, Valve didn't do a great job of actually telling anyone of that requirement, so I'm sure there are more hidden ones that will gradually obsolete your hardware based on the whims of the Chromium project.

[Start_Running]

Worth notic that although it may say Quad core. My 13 year old dual core is handling it pretty nicely.

[Sirap]

Are you referring to the linked Valve Index requirements? Because it'd be far fetched to require even dual cores to run the Steam client.

[Mad Scientist]

Originally posted by Sirap:

(snip)

Note that the last post before you is from Apr 27, 2020, the discussion was over years ago.