Steam Error "The Steam service component is not working properly"

[Coward]

A while ago I moved Steam to an external harddrive (yes, I update the content location in 'Settings'.) but it stopped automatically starting up Steam at startup, probably because it loads in the ext. harddrive after it would normally start Steam. No big issue, but recently, when starting up Steam manually, I'm greeted by this Steam error:

"The Steam service component is not working properly on this computer. Reinstalling the Steam service requires administrator privileges."

If I choose "Install service" Steam crashes and nothing else seems to happen.
If I choose "Cancel", the error goes away and Steam starts up with no further issues.

Any ideas?

[Coward]

Any help?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Install Steam on your internal drive and point to the Steam folder on the external drive.

Steam has issues on external drives.

[Coward]

Why did it only pop up later then, though?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Because...

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Steam has issues on external drives.

External Hard Drives

External hard drives are not recommended for use with Steam or Steam's games. Aside from many potential performance issues, external hard drives may connect or disconnect from the computer at inopportune times as part of their normal operations. If you encounter this issue with an external drive, install Steam and your games to an internal drive instead.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=8379-RYIP-2998

[Coward]

Thanks, I'll look into that.