Files disappearing when I move or download games to an external hard drive

[Narty]

Not hidden, but GONE.

A while ago, I got myself an external HDD for extra storage space. For a couple months, I had no issues. And then the problem started one day when I tried moving one game from an internal drive, the files disappears everytime I restart my PC. So I formatted my HDD.

I thought I got off the hook, so I started downloading games to this empty HDD. It actually started off well when I downloaded Carrion. I can play it with no problem whatsoever. But when I started downloading other games, I get "corrupt update files".

What do I do?

Also, if you're about to copy paste on what steam says about using external HDD, please don't bother. I don't want to hear it.

[Zekiran]

You need to stop steam from turning itself on at startup.

Externals are acceptable IF AND ONLY IF they are fully on and spinning when Steam STARTS.

So make sure that if you have games on an external that:

** The drive always has the same drive letter (d: j: etc) when it is plugged in

** The drive is ALWAYS on BEFORE Steam is started

** The computer gets shut down properly every time, that means: shutting steam down before turning the computer's power off

** Don't allow your computer to go into Hibernation or Sleep mode while Steam is on - steam and sleep mode do not play well together with everyone's systems. While this might not be universal it certainly plays into steam forgetting what it's supposed to be doing

[Narty]

I think I managed to fix it, so to any future readers... Pay attention! It might work for you!

Follow these steps:
1. Set the hard disk to never sleep/turn off - this can be done through control panel>hardware and sound>power option>edit plan settings and then clicking "Change advanced power settings". From there, find "Hard disk" in the list and change the "Turn off hard disk after" to "Never" or just "0". Do this for both "On battery" and "Plugged in".

2. Turn off "Read-only" attributes on the steamapps folder - do it by opening the properties of the steamapps folder. You should see it in the main page. Turn it off. When asked, just pick "Apply changes to this folder, subfolders and files".

Note: for some reason, for me at least, the "Read-only" attribute turns back on even after I turn it off. Ignore it. You'll probably be fine.

3. Clear download cache - in the steam settings, go to "Downloads". There should be a button to do it. Press it. Do it.

As a test, I redownloaded three games with the least file sizes that I own, which are Carrion, Geometry Dash, and Haydee (Don't ask. I play for the plot.), and everything seems to run just fine.

Also,

Originally posted by Zekiran:

You need to stop steam from turning itself on at startup.

Externals are acceptable IF AND ONLY IF they are fully on and spinning when Steam STARTS.

So make sure that if you have games on an external that:

** The drive always has the same drive letter (d: j: etc) when it is plugged in

** The drive is ALWAYS on BEFORE Steam is started

** The computer gets shut down properly every time, that means: shutting steam down before turning the computer's power off

** Don't allow your computer to go into Hibernation or Sleep mode while Steam is on - steam and sleep mode do not play well together with everyone's systems. While this might not be universal it certainly plays into steam forgetting what it's supposed to be doing

DO heed Zekiran's advice. I tried to get my PC to sleep mode immediately after everything seems to be in order. Just to see what would happen. Steam couldn't find the Geometry Dash files and had to scan again, but managed to launch Carrion just fine. I guess the HDD needed a few seconds to start becoming visible to steam again. I'd say you should wait for at least 20 seconds after startup.