Cloud synch re-enabling itself (repeatedly) after being disabled

[KonekoKagai]

I've already submitted this to support itself. As they pointed out, posting about the problem here could help them get an idea of how many people are having the same problem (or at least help others know they're not alone with having the problem). They've also said they don't currently HAVE a fix for this problem.

As it says on the label, I keep disabling Cloud synch - which I really wish was opt-in rather than opt-out - and it keeps re-enabling itself. My best guess is that some Steam updates are resetting that decision without my consent, but I have no real way to pinpoint it since I usually play offline.

I keep finding out the hard way that it's happened - since it doesn't tell me when it's turning it back on - when I do go online with Steam and my saves end up mangled or outright broken (the most recent time corrupted my quick and auto saves in Skyrim, for example). There wasn't even a file conflict window to ask about if I wanted to overwrite...and I've only ever gotten that screen once, despite the multiple instances across multiple games.

[Malstrom]

ISSUE SOLVED


Solution

1 - Open Steam Client as Admin
2 - Disable Cloud sync in settings
3 - Exit Steam Client
4 - Restart Steam normally

and the job was done, well for the moment. anyways...

hope this helps if Zeugziumy solution doesn't help you.
also cheers for the assist @ Zeugziumy did try your work around first but it kept repairing itself

[Zeugziumy]

Originally posted by Sellestro:

ISSUE SOLVED


Solution

1 - Open Steam Client as Admin
2 - Disable Cloud sync in settings
3 - Exit Steam Client
4 - Restart Steam normally

and the job was done, well for the moment. anyways...

hope this helps if Zeugziumy solution doesn't help you.
also cheers for the assist @ Zeugziumy did try your work around first but it kept repairing itself

Hm, that works. Strangely, I only had to open Steam via Admin and it automatically disabled the Steam Cloud for the game I wanted to, without having me to do anything. It's like if the "task" of disabling Steam Cloud has been trying in the background until it was able to do or something.

I will leave the remote folder without write access in case it re-enables itself for some reason. Thank you so much for the solution. Now, I don't need to always click on the "sync" error message when opening my game for the first time after launching Steam.

Edit: I added your solution (by quoting your response) on top of my long workaround explanation, so people who is going page by page can try yours first before mine.

[Deuce Loosely]

Originally posted by Zeugziumy:

Originally posted by Sellestro:

See my response above yours, it's not the definitive solution, but it's a workaround, as it will no longer obtain files from the Steam Cloud for a specific game.

It is much simpler to race to settings/cloud and untick it on starting Steam honestly. It's a PITA and still deserves the Steam Staff's attention, IMO, but that was SUPER involved.

[Deuce Loosely]

Originally posted by Sellestro:

ISSUE SOLVED


Solution

1 - Open Steam Client as Admin
2 - Disable Cloud sync in settings
3 - Exit Steam Client
4 - Restart Steam normally

and the job was done, well for the moment. anyways...

hope this helps if Zeugziumy solution doesn't help you.
also cheers for the assist @ Zeugziumy did try your work around first but it kept repairing itself

It was set to admin to begin with and this doesn't work sadly. It's not that I expect the answer from you, but the hope is others that see this and are still having issues will know they're not alone so they don't keep going crazy looking for a solution. Steam had a look at my cloud log file and confirmed there was something hinky there and then just sort of dropped the thread. Hopefully it will be addressed in an update. Maybe if you're like me and still having the issue, shake their tree about it also and get some more data and eyeballs on the issue.

[CoVid XXX Productions Ltd.]

It turns it back on for me for each game separately and even as a global setting, it does not matter, steam just wants me to sync. "Sir, we insist."

And that's how tens of my savegames got corrupted.

[John Democracy]

I too have recently started getting this problem and have tried everything on this thread to no avail.

[DarthVitrial]

Happening to me too. Tried everything listed here, no luck. Every single time I open steam it insists on downloading several gigabytes of Skyrim saves I don’t want over my poor 500kbps dsl network, and nothing I can do can stop it.
I’ve contacted steam support and they just reply with a pre written “steam cloud can be turned off in options!” Reply that totally ignores that the option isn’t working.

[Flizzy]

I just was about to open up a post because I'm having the same issue. Whenever I disable the usage of Steam cloud in the Steam settings or in the game settings directly, it always auto-enables itself when starting Steam the next time.
Tried all the steps from above, nothing seems to help tho.

[DarthVitrial]

Maybe if everyone in this thread contacts Steam Support, one of us might get a helpful response...

[Flizzy]

So I contacted the Steam Support talking about this issue, asking for a known fix or if it is intended to be like that and long story short: No known fix

Furthermore, they encourage me (and I assume also everyone else with the issue) to check "the more active Steam community hubs" to maybe find an answer there and that "the Steam team uses a number of community sources to help investigate the frequency and severity of issues like this" to might fix it in an upcoming Steam Update - no specifics given. So I guess we just have to wait.

[DarthVitrial]

That's unfortunate. Hopefully they fix it eventually...

[Ian RB]

Originally posted by Zeugziumy:

I know this an old-ish thread, but I found an workaround for those having this problem. I recently upgraded my PC and I started having the same issue as well. The solution will not make the "Steam Cloud" option per game save between Steam sessions (closing and opening), however, it will block Steam from downloading from the cloud for that specific game.

That means, this won't affect other games you want to have the Steam Cloud enabled.

I will use Team Fortress 2 as an example as it was the one I did this method.

Before attempting this, try Sellestro's method first (which was posted after mine), as it's way easier. In case that doesn't work, then you can try my workaround.

Originally posted by Sellestro:

ISSUE SOLVED


Solution

1 - Open Steam Client as Admin
2 - Disable Cloud sync in settings
3 - Exit Steam Client
4 - Restart Steam normally

and the job was done, well for the moment. anyways...

hope this helps if Zeugziumy solution doesn't help you.
also cheers for the assist @ Zeugziumy did try your work around first but it kept repairing itself

(You may require Admin privileges for this to work).

So, do the following:
1) Open Steam, click on "Steam" at the top-left, and click on "Settings".

2) Go to "Interface" and enable "Display web address bars when available" and click OK.

3) Go to your LIBRARY section and left-click on the game you want to disable Steam cloud, and go to "Store Page".

4) At the URL on top, see the value on top after "app/", for example in TF2, that would be "440":



(Keep in mind that every time I mention "440", that's the game ID I'm using as an example, this will change depending on the game you want to block the Steam Cloud, use the ID you found by visiting the Store Page).

5) Close your game and Steam (closing Steam is optional, but recommended).

6) Open your File Explorer and go to "C:\Program Files\Steam\userdata\*YourSteamID3*\440\remote" (if it's not on "C:\Program Files", then go to the folder where you installed Steam).

(You can find your SteamID3 by using websites like " www.steamidfinder.com ", you paste your profile URL there and it will give several info. The one you are looking for is "steamID3". The numbers after "U:1:" is the ID you must look for on the userdata folder).

7) Delete every file inside the remote, but keep the folders as is (I don't know if there's a problem or not also deleting the folders, but I decided to keep it, if for some reason the game throws you an error, then you can try deleting the folders as well).

8) In the case of TF2, I only removed the files inside "cfg" and "materials/vgui/logos". I kept the files inside "my_custom_images" intact, as well "item_clientacks.txt" and "stamped_items_mru.txt" files intact.

(I use a custom config for TF2 and the one on the Cloud is very outdated, as for the materials folder, that means that my currently selected spray won't be reverted to the last one saved on the Steam cloud. You will also need to disable the "Synchronize with the Steam Cloud" in TF2's Advanced Options).

9) Go back to "440", and right-click on the "remote" folder, and go to "Properties", now go to the "Security" tab.

10) Select "Authenticated Users" and click "Edit". Scroll down on the permissions section, and check the "Deny" box for "Write" permissions.

11) Press OK. Windows will show you some warnings, you may want to read them, but you can press OK if you are, well, OK with it. Now press OK again on the Properties window.

Note: Because I left some files intact on TF2's case, I only put the permissions on the "cfg" and "materials" folder, and not the entire "remote" folder.

What this means is that Windows now does not allow any program to write to that folder, which includes Steam and the cloud trying to download your files.

A downside to this is that, whenever you open the game in question, it will mention that it couldn't sync with Steam, but... this only happens the first time you launch after launching Steam... but it will mention again that it couldn't sync if you close and re-open Steam (or shut down and turn on your computer). However, this is much better than having to right-click on the game, disabling the option, saving the option, and launching the game every time you open/restart Steam, plus, you won't lose your local save data with this method, as it won't get replaced by Steam Cloud.

If that doesn't work, you can also try deleting "remotecache.vdf" from the game's ID folder, and setting the permission to deny the writing to "gameIDfolder", as opposed to the "gameID/remote" folder, however, I did not attempt this and I can't guarantee that it's safe and/or that it works.

Please be careful when using the Permission functionality on Windows. You may end up having problems if using incorrectly or in random folders/files. I'm not responsible if anything goes awry with your computer.

As a fun fact, I use the same method that I explained here to enable only my sprays to be visible in TF2 while everyone else is invisible.

Whenever you spray in TF2, it saves to the "temp" folder. I sprayed my sprays at least one time with the folder having writing permissions allowed, and later put the permission to deny writing access to the "Steam\steamapps\common\Team Fortress 2\tf\materials\temp" folder after I sprayed everything I had (as well disabling the "Delete Temporary Files During Shutdown" on Advanced options).

Because the game also writes to the "temp" folder when spraying your own sprays, you will need to temporarily revert the permission you set to the "temp" folder in order to save any new sprays you may import to the game in the future.

I have no idea if this works with Steam Cloud on / not blocked, though. Possibly yes.

Thanks for posting this my guy, no other suggestion/workaround has worked for me but this.
For anyone else that might read this, in my example I wanted to deactivate the cloud saves for the Witcher 3, so I went to my userdata folder and inside '292030' (game id folder) there was only a remotecache.vdf file, so I deleted it, restricted the access to the game folder as explained by Zeugziumy, and voila, fixed!

[Zeugziumy]

Originally posted by Ian RB:

Thanks for posting this my guy, no other suggestion/workaround has worked for me but this.
For anyone else that might read this, in my example I wanted to deactivate the cloud saves for the Witcher 3, so I went to my userdata folder and inside '292030' (game id folder) there was only a remotecache.vdf file, so I deleted it, restricted the access to the game folder as explained by Zeugziumy, and voila, fixed!

Awesome. I added your reply as a quote to my explanation, as an example of a game that requires removing the "remotecache.vdf".

[MΛRCUS HΞLIUS]

Still no fix for this?

[Cranberry]

Same problem. In my Settings, the cloud sync keeps enabling itself every time i launch Steam.

Steam, please fix!