Steamwebhelper crash(?), black and unusable UI

[wurstd]

I've seen multiple people over the decade with the same problem (had the problem for about 4 years at this point), but the new UI update made things 10x worse.

Basically, it seems like "steamwebhelper.exe" just decides to disappear or something when I have windows like "Library" and "Friends and chat" open, which in turn makes those windows black and unusable. Video of it happening in action[kompis.s-ul.eu]

With the UI update, it seems like it's trying to "fix itself"..? What that means is that it basically tabs me out of the game to open a window of the client again... And it just goes in this cycle forever and ever.
Steam is still open in the background, but clicking the Steam icon in the notification area does nothing at all, clicking it repeatedly shows me this[cdn.discordapp.com] window. Restarting Steam makes the client work for a while, until it inevitably goes black again. Restarting steamwebhelper does the same thing.

My "cef_log.txt" (./Steam/logs/cef_log.txt) shows something about a "Network service crashed, restarting service" and a "WebSocket connection failed: Unknown reason" to a steamloopback.host link.

I've scoured every corner I've found online for a fix for these problems, to no avail. What I can remember I've tried:
- Running Steam.exe as administrator
- Running steamwebhelper.exe as administrator
- Reinstalled Steam
- Offline mode
- Steam beta
- GPU accelerated rendering in web views (both ON and OFF)
- Hardware video decoding (both ON and OFF)
- minigameslist (blacks out as well)
- Clearing download cache
- Deleting web browser data
- Repairing Steam game directory folders
- Updating GPU drivers
- Rollback GPU drivers

I'm honestly at a loss for what to do at this point, is it really just on Steam's end here?

I'm using Windows 10 Home, 21H2

[Blanco_Niño]

same issue. New update ♥♥♥♥♥♥ me.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Not sure on your case for this, do have anything that trying to hook into steam client? Anything that mess with file, and permission, or process like antivirus, and such?

From what I guess it seem like it just crash that about it, and from your log it said crash which I assume correct.


Just testing when have friend window close does it still happen?

Another testing, disable animated avatars go to steam settings > friends & chat > disable "enable animated avatars" > restart client, and test does it still happen?

[RANGER]

They should be aware of the issues, hot fix is probably coming soon. Chill out guys.

[wurstd]

Originally posted by Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

Not sure on your case for this, do have anything that trying to hook into steam client? Anything that mess with file, and permission, or process like antivirus, and such?

From what I guess it seem like it just crash that about it, and from your log it said crash which I assume correct.


Just testing when have friend window close does it still happen?

Another testing, disable animated avatars go to steam settings > friends & chat > disable "enable animated avatars" > restart client, and test does it still happen?

I'm almost certain nothing is trying to "hook" onto the client after a lot of testing. It goes black regardless of having the friends and chat window open.
The interesting part is that disabling "animated avatars" seemed to prolong the time of the client not being black, I sat like 20 more minutes than I usually do, with a game open, and it didn't go black. But it inevitably did after a while.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Originally posted by wurst:

Originally posted by Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

Not sure on your case for this, do have anything that trying to hook into steam client? Anything that mess with file, and permission, or process like antivirus, and such?

From what I guess it seem like it just crash that about it, and from your log it said crash which I assume correct.


Just testing when have friend window close does it still happen?

Another testing, disable animated avatars go to steam settings > friends & chat > disable "enable animated avatars" > restart client, and test does it still happen?

The "enable animated avatars" bit seems to SOMEHOW work, I have no idea what kind of black magic that is. At first I tried to disable it with no restart (where it just blacked out after starting a game), but after restarting, it seems like after 10-15-20 minutes, the client still hasn't gone black. Might be a temporary fix, I'll come back if it isn't.

Keep us posted, if this is a problem then I assume old bug back where related to those animated avatars, and frames causing crash, people complain when it happen to the friend list.

[RiO]

Originally posted by RANGER:

They should be aware of the issues, hot fix is probably coming soon. Chill out guys.

The black screen issue comes and goes and has been an ongoing problem since the very first moment Valve decided to reimplement parts of Steam on top of Chromium.

The new update just makes it far, far worse. Where those Chromium parts used to be isolated before, there's now one big overarching Chromium 'tab' for everything.

If the renderer goes dead; the client goes dead entirely.

Valve added a safety feature which kicks in if the process actually crashes. In this case it pops up a VGUI (yes; the irony...) powered dialog that gives you the option to relaunch Steam incl. options to do so without HW-accelerated rendering or without browser sandboxing. (Please; never do the latter! Major security hazard with the outdated Chromium on which Steam is built!)

However, if the renderer goes dead and black screens, that's not a process crash - so you don't get that dialog. (And you can't close off Steam in the normal way to restart it either.)

[stratvox]

I'm experiencing something extremely similar, and I'm running this on linux. I can pretty much guarantee you it's a steam problem. I have a question for the OP; are you running nvidia or amd? I have amd gpus in both systems here and they both exhibit the same problem. As a workaround, I've found that right clicking on the icon in the dock and selecting "Library" allows it to get started, after which it's fine. I'm not so sure how that works in Windows land, but if you have that as a start option it may be worth trying until they fix their stuff. As an aside... steam support is clearly geared to ensuring that tickets get closed rather than problems get solved.

[RiO]

Originally posted by stratvox:

I'm experiencing something extremely similar, and I'm running this on linux. I can pretty much guarantee you it's a steam problem. I have a question for the OP; are you running nvidia or amd? I have amd gpus in both systems here and they both exhibit the same problem. As a workaround, I've found that right clicking on the icon in the dock and selecting "Library" allows it to get started, after which it's fine. I'm not so sure how that works in Windows land, but if you have that as a start option it may be worth trying until they fix their stuff. As an aside... steam support is clearly geared to ensuring that tickets get closed rather than problems get solved.

FWIW AMD GPUs have always been wonky with HW-accelerated rendering in the Steam Client. Keep it disabled, is what I'd do.

[wurstd]

Originally posted by stratvox:

I'm experiencing something extremely similar, and I'm running this on linux. I can pretty much guarantee you it's a steam problem. I have a question for the OP; are you running nvidia or amd? I have amd gpus in both systems here and they both exhibit the same problem. As a workaround, I've found that right clicking on the icon in the dock and selecting "Library" allows it to get started, after which it's fine. I'm not so sure how that works in Windows land, but if you have that as a start option it may be worth trying until they fix their stuff. As an aside... steam support is clearly geared to ensuring that tickets get closed rather than problems get solved.

I'm running nvidia, and the icon in the dock does nothing other than inevitably show that "Steamwebhelper is not responding" message if you click on it enough. Not even the menu shows up.

[wurstd]

Originally posted by RiO:

Valve added a safety feature which kicks in if the process actually crashes. In this case it pops up a VGUI (yes; the irony...) powered dialog that gives you the option to relaunch Steam incl. options to do so without HW-accelerated rendering or without browser sandboxing. (Please; never do the latter! Major security hazard with the outdated Chromium on which Steam is built!)

Correction: I'm currently doing a band-aid fix to the Steam client tabbing me out of the game and restarting itself by going VGUI mode. It seems to work (more like, be as horrible as it's always been MINUS the tabbing out part) after testing for about half an hour with a game open.

More about the whole "VGUI mode" thing here:
https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/0/6516193260168294059/

I kind of don't trust it though, since I think I notice stray "client restarts" from within the client itself.
I'll post an update after some usage, probably.

[wurstd]

Update: Valve apparently FORCIBLY removed VGUI mode, so we're back to square one. Back to steam tabbing me out midgame.

[wurstd]

Hey, small update:
I "fixed" the issue, with something that is NOT a fix by any stretch of the imagination, and I won't straight out give it out here in case Steam decides to ♥♥♥♥ it up for even more years - but let's just say that steamwebhelper isn't running anymore.

[shakendö]

Originally posted by wurst:

Hey, small update:
I "fixed" the issue, with something that is NOT a fix by any stretch of the imagination, and I won't straight out give it out here in case Steam decides to ♥♥♥♥ it up for even more years - but let's just say that steamwebhelper isn't running anymore.

Would be nice to hear about this fix, sadly I cannot hop onto dms since Steam won't even get past the bootstrap (when checking the updates. It just throws the ''Steamwebhelper, a critical... blah blah''). Can't even get to log in.. lol. Tried everything I could think of (firewall & windows defender exceptions/downgrading Steam/putting commands at the steam startup properties/opting in the beta.... nothing yet, this started happening since the weekend, which means I haven't played since then.

The most strange thing is getting this error out of nowhere, I did not update anything driver-related nor Windows, yet when wanting to play I've hop onto that error.

Gotta love how Valve has enough time to get rid of most commands that fix these issues, but won't move a finger when it comes to memory leaks and general trouble with the new and ''revolutionary'' Steam client. But anyways, like we say, PRAISE LORD GABEN!!!!

[Kage Goomba]

OK - color me curious - and I may regret this.

But what is the common denominator - what are you guys doing that makes me not see this.
Older Computer?
Are you using something that is different?

I'm just morbidly curious.

[shakendö]

Originally posted by Kage Goomba:

OK - color me curious - and I may regret this.

But what is the common denominator - what are you guys doing that makes me not see this.
Older Computer?
Are you using something that is different?

I'm just morbidly curious.

An Y540 laptop should be more than enough to not stumble upon these issues. Did Steam change those minimum specs to some prototype-type computer? Doubt yet.

It's just me the one having this error atm, although the steam support said they're aware of the issue ''We are aware of the problem and most of the users having this issue has bitdefender antivirus and/or malwarebytes running. Please try to confirm again and making an exception for the entire Steam folder in your antivirus.'' , which is not because it has been ongoing for a while really.

EDIT: Something I noticed in the logs is ''Failed to load cached hosts file (File 'update_hosts_cached.vdf' not found), using defaults'' did google a fix, threads couldn't find a way to circumvent it sadly...