External Hard drive Steam File disappeared

[IY]

Hey, so I was just browsing steam store and suddenly I get a pop-up saying that my external hard drive has ran into an error. After scanning and repairing it (done automatically) the steam file had gone missing! The only new file is an empty folder labeled "dumps". Any idea how this happened or how to restore steam?

[The Giving One]

It is not recommended to install Steam on external Hard drives.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7418-YUBN-8129

Important:

It is not recommended that you install Steam to an external hard drive, due to potential performance issues.

[IY]

Thanks for the fast response. I've bin using it for a year now without any performance issues. I played all my games perfectly fine. But the steam file just had completely banished! I don't see how it would run into this issue now.

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by I.Y.:

Thanks for the fast response. I've bin using it for a year now without any performance issues. I played all my games perfectly fine. But the steam file just had completely banished! I don't see how it would run into this issue now.

But you have an issue now.

What is your antivirus program ?

[IY]

Windows defender

[The Giving One]

You said that the external drive ran into an error. Please post the exact words of that error message. What error was that ?

[♥Miichaellᴳᴬᴹᴱ★]

Originally posted by The Giving One:

It is not recommended to install Steam on external Hard drives.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7418-YUBN-8129

Important:

It is not recommended that you install Steam to an external hard drive, due to potential performance issues.

[IY]

I didn't memorize it but it was a window that had a button below, "scan external hard drive for errors" after that it told me to close it and choose the repair option. It's really odd because it still says 630GB available from the 931GB total space. That was the amount steam took up but doesn't show up anymore.

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by I.Y.:

I didn't memorize it but it was a window that had a button below, "scan external hard drive for errors" after that it told me to close it and choose the repair option. It's really odd because it still says 630GB available from the 931GB total space. That was the amount steam took up but doesn't show up anymore.

And this is why installing Steam to external drives is not recommended, or one reason that is.

Sounds like you did a disk check for read or write error for that drive.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=9709-FKCB-4230

I cannot say it will help, but you can try right clicking that drive in Windows and then properties, and then the tab "previous versions" to see if you can get a previous version of the drive back from a restore point. If you have any and that drive was saved in a restore point for you that is.

[IY]

So I scanned the ed and it said it had not detected any errors. We can cross out restoring because I did not create a restore point for my ed. (Don't even know how)

[IY]

I found a couple of errors Event Viewer saying "A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds) while waiting for the Steam Client Service service to connect." That's the only error I found relating to steam.

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by I.Y.:

So I scanned the ed and it said it had not detected any errors. We can cross out restoring because I did not create a restore point for my ed. (Don't even know how)

Well, I would say that you cannot cross that out until you try. Windows creates restore points automatically also. So did you even try that ?

[IY]

Windows automatically creates a restore point for ed's? If so, I don't know the steps to restoring it.

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by I.Y.:

Windows automatically creates a restore point for ed's? If so, I don't know the steps to restoring it.

I just listed the steps above for you....

Originally posted by The Giving One:

I cannot say it will help, but you can try right clicking that drive in Windows and then properties, and then the tab "previous versions" to see if you can get a previous version of the drive back from a restore point. If you have any and that drive was saved in a restore point for you that is.

[IY]

There is no tab labeled "previous versions"

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by I.Y.:

Unfortunely I didn't see a restore option under the tool tab.

Then sadly, all I can suggest is that you try a restore point for your entire computer.

WARNING....

I cannot be responsible for any changes this does to your computer or any market restrictions or account restrictions that this may cause.