100% Disk Active time while downloading

[Captain Smooth Brain]

I recently upgraded my C: drive from a HDD to an SSD and noticed that every time steam is downloading, my PC becomes slow to the point where it becomes un-useable. I checked the task manager and noticed the C: drive Active time is at 100%, but I looked at the read/write speed and it didn't look like the disk was doing much. I download all my games to my D: drive and I double checked to make sure I wasn't accidentally downloading to the C: drive. I read that SSD performance can go down when the drive gets close to full, but this drive is only about half full. This doesn't happen with any other download source, only steam. I'm not sure if I had this issue before upgrading to the SSD, because the HDD was slow to begin with so maybe I just didn't notice it before since I always had to wait on the drive to keep up. Any insight or suggestions would be appreciated!

[Lavie]

Hi!

If you Google the issue, you wil find some things to try... For example:

its 16.10.2018 and i fixed with easier way then it should be but it worked. here how it is.

open your task manager.
right click to *steam client bootstraper*
resource values > disk

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/364042262877185864/

It maybe the same bug that I have seen with other users.
Try disabling write caching on the device and see if that makes a difference.

Originally posted by Deadshot:
Hope I could help someone :)
You should fix your quote, didn't notice you already offered this option.

Disabling this setting, and re-enabling it may also fix the issue.
Keep in mind that if it is caused by this setting, it is a bug.
I heard in another thread that not just Steam is affected, but also any Diagnostics tool that would scan the SSD for issues.

I recommend contacting Western Digital about the issue.
https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/3820780544825980463/

[Iceira]

+ Some Anti-virus app do live scan that mean performance lost to install task.
if your disk is 100% busy that mean it doing something, you need windows resources manager inside task manger to know what is going on at that disk.

snf this reply is extension of what already been said. as above user point out.

[󠀡󠀡]

I have several SSDs, and when Steam downloads to one of my slower SSDs sometimes it maxes it out, according to the task manager. Not all SSDs are the same and some of the worst SSDs have pretty bad random read/write performance. So it's not out of the realm of possibility that Steam is maxing out your SSD while downloading.

[Captain Smooth Brain]

Originally posted by quaixor:

I have several SSDs, and when Steam downloads to one of my slower SSDs sometimes it maxes it out, according to the task manager. Not all SSDs are the same and some of the worst SSDs have pretty bad random read/write performance. So it's not out of the realm of possibility that Steam is maxing out your SSD while downloading.

I thought my 2.5" SSD was fast at 550 MB/s read and 500MB/s write, because Google told me that'll be good as a primary drive, but there are m.2 drives at over 6000MB/s. I might need to upgrade again, and use my 2.5" SSD as a high speed storage drive.

[MancSoulja]

Originally posted by LightShift:

Originally posted by quaixor:

I have several SSDs, and when Steam downloads to one of my slower SSDs sometimes it maxes it out, according to the task manager. Not all SSDs are the same and some of the worst SSDs have pretty bad random read/write performance. So it's not out of the realm of possibility that Steam is maxing out your SSD while downloading.

I thought my 2.5" SSD was fast at 550 MB/s read and 500MB/s write, because Google told me that'll be good as a primary drive, but there are m.2 drives at over 6000MB/s. I might need to upgrade again, and use my 2.5" SSD as a high speed storage drive.

A good HDD can read at 300ish MB\s so SATA SSDs are not really much of a jump.

If you have a Ryzen 7000 series of Intel 13th series CPU, there's SSDs that can R/W at double those speeds 12,000 MB\s

https://www.ebuyer.com/1832636-crucial-t700-4tb-pcie-gen5-nvme-m-2-ssd-ct4000t700ssd3

[󠀡󠀡]

Originally posted by MancSoulja:

Originally posted by LightShift:

I thought my 2.5" SSD was fast at 550 MB/s read and 500MB/s write, because Google told me that'll be good as a primary drive, but there are m.2 drives at over 6000MB/s. I might need to upgrade again, and use my 2.5" SSD as a high speed storage drive.

A good HDD can read at 300ish MB\s so SATA SSDs are not really much of a jump.

If you have a Ryzen 7000 series of Intel 13th series CPU, there's SSDs that can R/W at double those speeds 12,000 MB\s

https://www.ebuyer.com/1832636-crucial-t700-4tb-pcie-gen5-nvme-m-2-ssd-ct4000t700ssd3

Linear read and write speed is the wrong metric here because the disk access that Steam does is seek-heavy. HDDs don't even come close to even the slowest SSDs when it comes to seek-dominated workloads.

[brrr]

I still having the same problem bro, did you find a solution?, discable write cache on windows disk didn't helped for me.
I really tried many things, and the problem stills 100% same as your post

[Schrobes]

you have discrepancies. It is trying to find things. Your Steam should not gather information beyond what you initially give it. for instance....

Drives it can install too, drives it will gather drivers, operating system, other codes.

You probably just need to uninstall and reinstall Steam.

BE WARNED! YOU NEED TO BACKUP YOUR STEAM INSTALLS FIRST/

Deleting and Reinstalling Steam will wipe your game installs, so MAKE SURE YOU BACKUP YOUR GAMES FIRST!

[Connie]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.