Steam download speed dropping to 0Kbps

[Luke S]

This has been happening since before christmas, an update or new game download will start and increase to about 20-25Mbps and then just instantly become 0Kbps then raise to about 10Mbps and drop again to 0Kbps, it does this over and over dropping every 5-10 seconds to 0kbps and staying there for about 10 seconds.

I tried changing download locations and I have no limits on my speed in steam settings, I tried to remove the config and appcache folders which had no effect on the speed, Speedtests report normal and downloads outside steam seem unaffected.

[76561198218426745]

Steam compresses the download, so it could be that your PC needs time to decompress it, or simply to write it to disk.

[Luke S]

what would cause this to happen just out of nowhere? it was ok early december and before that. I mean what would cause it to need more time to decompress and have to drop the download?

[76561198218426745]

I don't have a good answer for that. It could be your hard drive needs to be defragmented, or is simply nearing capacity. It could also be that is not what is happening. Are you connecting via wi-fi? Can you try connecting via ethernet?

[Luke S]

Its wired connection, also I just tried going threw a Denmark connection, I am in the UK... the Denmark connection seemed to do a full download without dropping, Manchester and London connections are dropping. maybe its just a Location problem?

[76561198218426745]

Could be server congestion, yeah.

[walldorlukkas]

Never happen to me, but then again i live in romania and have a very good connection

[_Naletchik]

of

[✪paradise]

™

[Luke S]

Seems to have fixed itself for now, I have not changed anything, just works atleast for the moment.

[νуѕєяιαи]

Originally posted by habitualaction:

Steam compresses the download, so it could be that your PC needs time to decompress it, or simply to write it to disk.

This is what caused it for me, when I download into my external hard disk, it drops to 0, but if I download into my internal hard disk, the download speed it constant.

[76561198286469030]

how to decompress pc ?

[xXxR34P3RxXx]

better internet?

[Blackhawk]

I am having this problem as well. I've got excellent speed (in excess of 80 down.) It keeps dropping to zero. I tried multiple download regions and have the same issue.

I'm in a group chat that has people in Denver and Oklahoma, and they are having the same issue.