Disk Write Error on SSD?

[Telepylos]

So, for some reason, Steam is refusing to install games on my SSD. It gets ~2/3 of the way through downloading, before stopping and giving a message saying "DISK WRITE ERROR".

I've tried:
-Restarting the installation
-Restarting the Steam client
-Restarting the Internet
-Restarting the computer
-Installing games on my HDD (works, but my HDD is full and I need to use my SSD)
-Running Steam as an administrator
-Checking the background processes
-Disabling my antivirus/firewall
-Defragmenting and checking my SSD for problems (none found, I can install smaller programs (<1 gb) just fine)

Nothing works. How do I fix this?

[Theblaze]

Is your SSD formated in NTFS?.

[Telepylos]

Originally posted by Theblaze:

Is your SSD formated in NTFS?.

Yes, it is. It also has ~110 GB free, so there shouldn't be an issue with that.

[Iceira]

Check disk and rest is at Brand support hardisk support page.
and i doubt its the game devs DL that is buggy , but its seen before.

Also try Validate intergrity of files.

clear Download cache if you have cache corrupted so install keep fail.
do have Login/pw rdy.

[Telepylos]

Originally posted by Iceira:

Check disk and rest is at Brand support hardisk support page.
and i doubt its the game devs DL that is buggy , but its seen before.

Also try Validate intergrity of files.

clear Download cache if you have cache corrupted so install keep fail.
do have Login/pw rdy.

I've cleared the download cache, I forgot to state that in the OP. It did not fix the issue.

I've tried downloading several different games, and they all ran into the same issue.

My hard drive is an ADATA SU800. I've downloaded the ADATA SSD Toolbox. Any suggestions on what I should run to fix this?

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by Telepylos:

So, for some reason, Steam is refusing to install games on my SSD. It gets ~2/3 of the way through downloading, before stopping and giving a message saying "DISK WRITE ERROR".

If you see it actually was working for most of the installation, but later gave the error, that does seem like it could be a space issue and more on that is below.

Originally posted by Telepylos:

Yes, it is. It also has ~110 GB free, so there shouldn't be an issue with that.

It could be, depending on the game we are talking about. For example, in my library, Atlas reads as being 110 GB all on its own.

You need to be sure, absolutely sure, that you have plenty of free space on the drive, even after you add up all the games storage space that will be taken up.

[crunchyfrog]

First thing I'd do is check that the drive isn't faulty.

Try downloading ANYTHING to get to fill that drive up. Mkae up a folder, say and just dump loads of stuff in there with junk downloads. If you get the same sort of error pop up, then you can be sure there's some sort of issue with the drive.

However, if it doesn't then you can just delete that folder entirely and try something else.

Just a heads up. It doesn't matter so much HOW much space you have left because you must remember a couple of things. Steam requires NO MORE than 90% of the total drive's space used as it will affect performance. It';s quite common to see downloads fail, or not complete or just install to the wrong drive when you overfill the drive to this extent.

Also downloads require as a rule of thumb, THREE times the total file size to download, because it needs to decompress the files and unencrypt them. And that means you also have to include that in your 90% consideration too.

[The Giving One]

Sorry, forgot to include this support page, which also includes troubleshooting tips for the old support page for disk write errors :

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=2274-IFLV-5334

EDIT................

Originally posted by Telepylos:

-Defragmenting and checking my SSD for problems (none found, I can install smaller programs (<1 gb) just fine)

Sorry, I missed this also.

Never defrag an SSD. That is not needed for modern operating systems and could eventually cause issues with the drive.

HDD yes. SSD no, never do that.

[Telepylos]

So, I managed to get a ~6GB game to download without any issues so far. I'm currently testing a larger game; I'll update if I run into the same problem. Thanks for all the help!

[Telepylos]

Never mind, I tried installing a ~42GB game and it stopped right at ~28GB, which is the same point it's been stopping at.

I'm at my wits end. I have no idea what to try now.

[The Giving One]

If you could get the 6 GB game to install without issues, but the larger game would not and stopped during the middle of the process, that still sounds like the drive is running out of space to me. So far from what you said, that is.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by Telepylos:

Never mind, I tried installing a ~42GB game and it stopped right at ~28GB, which is the same point it's been stopping at.

I'm at my wits end. I have no idea what to try now.

So did you try what I said?
Do the game's make it run to 90% of disk space used?
Have you tried downloading more stuff (not Steam) to see if it also halts at that point?

This is precisely why I asked you to do this.

[Telepylos]

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Originally posted by Telepylos:

Never mind, I tried installing a ~42GB game and it stopped right at ~28GB, which is the same point it's been stopping at.

I'm at my wits end. I have no idea what to try now.

So did you try what I said?
Do the game's make it run to 90% of disk space used?
Have you tried downloading more stuff (not Steam) to see if it also halts at that point?

This is precisely why I asked you to do this.

It shouldn't be getting close to 90% full, the partition has over twice as much space as this game needs.

I'm at work right now, but when I get home I can try to fill the drive up and see what happens.

[The Giving One]

How many Windows Restore points do you have that are shown ?

I don't have Windows 10, if that is your OS, so I don't know how that works now :

https://www.thewindowsclub.com/how-to-delete-all-system-restore-points-and-previous-versions-of-files-in-windows-7

[xarvn]

Steam game files are not only compressed but encrypted. Steam requires free space to decode and decompress the game files. As you say, your hard drive is full and since Steam is installed therein, it may be running out of slack space. If your SSD were full then it would fail the file allocation that is performed every time games (or even game updates) are downloaded.

Try moving some of the existing games from your hard drive over to the SSD by right clicking on a game in your Library, going to Properties\Local Files and then "Move Install Folder." Repeat this until you have at least a 200 GB of free space on your hard drive. Try downloading a game to SSD. Do you get errors?

Edit. Free as much space as possible on the hard drive that the SSD capacity allows; i.e. leave at least 20% of the SSD free.

[Telepylos]

Originally posted by xarvn:

Steam game files are not only compressed but encrypted. Steam requires free space to decode and decompress the game files. As you say, your hard drive is full and since Steam is installed therein, it may be running out of slack space. If your SSD were full then it would fail the file allocation that is performed every time games (or even game updates) are downloaded.

Try moving some of the existing games from your hard drive over to the SSD by right clicking on a game in your Library, going to Properties\Local Files and then "Move Install Folder." Repeat this until you have at least a 200 GB of free space on your hard drive. Try downloading a game to SSD. Do you get errors?

Edit. Free as much space as possible on the hard drive that the SSD capacity allows; i.e. leave at least 20% of the SSD free.

Thats not quite how I have my system set up. I apologize, I probably should have organized my OP better.

I have a 250 gb SSD and a HDD drive (can't recall the capacity, but its close to full). About half my SSD is partitioned to my OS and essential programs/tools, the other half is a partition I use for games. Both partitions have plenty of empty space (well over 10%), so I don't think that's the issue.

The HDD drive is mostly used for storage and older games that don't benefit significantly from being on an SSD. I could probably clear out a bunch of space on that, but I'd rather use the space on the SSD.