Two computers using same library location across network?

[Forum Joe]

Hello, I need some technical help and I want to know if this is possible.

I have my main gaming PC desktop with my entire steam library on it. I have another computer connected to the main one through a gigabit ethernet connection, but HDD space is tight. I would like to know if I can set it so that the second computer can access the games off the first one through the network. I'm happy to play around, but my library is huge and I can't really back up the entire thing. I want to make sure it won't corrupt anything on the main computer.

[Nacimota]

I've never tried this so I can't say for sure if Steam will let you do it but I can say it is a bad idea. Loading resources from across the network is a lot slower than loading them off the disk. I imagine that would have a significant impact on game performance.

Unless you preload the whole game before it launches, but then starting large games like TF2 would take forever.

[Rove]

You might be more easily able to use some sort of game streaming technology to actually run the games on the main gaming rig but play them on the client computer. Something like OnLIve but a homebrew version or like what Nvidia Shield uses to stream PC games to the hand console.

Other then that you can probably set up the drive with your games to be a shared network resource and that might work fine. It may be a little slow because gigabye ethernet still only peaks at 125MB/s speeds and might even run slower than that continuously in practice. Still, all standard HDD are under 200 MB/s I think (my 7200RPM 3TB is 180-190 I think) so it will only be like 1/2 speed at worse if you are used to HDD gaming. If you regularly game off a SSD then it may be significantly slower because new SSD can run at 500~ MB/s.

It also might even run the games on your main computer while allowing you to play, easy no hassle streaming. I really do not know. I'm not that much on networking and honestly couldn't tell you how to even share the drive without researching it myself first. I'm sure you could configure it to do this somehow but it might even require custom programing. Your actual keyboard and mouse input and monitor output to and from a game are very low bandwidth and could easily be handled at 10MB/s I would think. So 125MB/s is overkill if you get it set up properly for streaming games running on the main rig.

It should not corrupt anything though unless your other PC has a virus. I could be wrong on that, so please do backup anything important.

[Soylent_Merchant]

A new Hard drive will be easier to work with

[_I_]

if you have gigabit lan and are not using wireless it could be ok, wont be much more lag than having the hdd local

[Richard M. Nixon]

This will work just fine. Once you install Steam on the secondary computer, delete the steamapps folder and make a symlink to the shared steamapps folder on the host pc. This will make a folder appear called (for example) C:\Steam\Steamapps that can be read by steam, but in reality the folder doesn't exist locally at all and just points to the network location like \\oldpc\steam\steamapps.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

In order for this to work, couple things...

U will want both PCs using wired network connections, wireless may work but the reading of those network shared files/folders will be much slower, unless it has a very stable wireless-N type of connection when using wireless.

On the PC you wish to have it's folder shared, u need to enable sharing on it in Windows for the C:\Steam\SteamApps folder. Then double check that it shows up across the Network on the PC u wish to see it on. Easiest way to do this is to set both PCs to Work for their Network type. Work instead of Home will disable HomeGroup. If your modem/router does not support TCP IPv6, disable this on both PCs network adapter, forcing them to only/always use IPv4, which overall will allow faster network hand-shaking.

On the PC u wish to connect to that shared folder, you need to map that network shared folder to a drive letter. So it shows up in Computer. Once this is done, on this PC open Steam, go to Settings > Downloads > Manage Library and add a new Steam Library and point to the network folder.

If u have a problem after the SteamApps folder is shared, it may need to be shared allowing both Read/Write access. To do that, edit the shared folder security permissions to allow "Guest" and "Everyone" which should clear that up.

[duplissi]

personally I would go with Nixon's suggestion. Keep in mind that if you dont want absurdly HIGH load times you will want to be connecting via wired gigabit. Also I am unsure if there are any system specific files (Files specfic to that computer) in the steam apps folder that may be messed up and cause all sorts of odd issues when one computer or the other access them


Honestly, just get a new HDD and save yourself the potential frustration.

[_I_]

if using one pc at a time it should be fine, but if using diff accts with shared steamapps, it could cause problems running the same game at the same time

[Bad 💀 Motha]

I would just get a new/larger HDD in general and do everything locally per machine. As with the whole network sharing BS, the host system will have to stay on. And sometimes u just need to reboot for certain reasons, so it just adds to the overall headache and such. Or get a NAS and some HDDs and do it that way.

With NAS setup, simply have Steam Client installed on your local PC systems. The contents of SteamApps with all the games on the NAS. Then on both systems, go in Steam > Settings > Downloads and add the NAS's folder location to your Steam Library Folders.

You can also avoid having to redownload games on multiple machines, by copying games over from the host machine and/or NAS.

Also if multiple PCs are going to share same games and/or access same account, make sure Cloud Sync Saving is disabled. Enabled is fine, long as you are not sharing same Steam account among multiple users. Like for me, I do share like this for my account, but it is so kids can access certain games I have installed for them locally and I have their Steam to remember my account, so they never know my info. But for this type of setup, I disable Cloud Sync Saving on their end, so their saves can never overwrite mine. And this way their saved games are saved only to the local PC, and not through Cloud.

[Forum Joe]

Wow, I'm amazed at the number of people here who don't read the question when providing a response, and tell me stuff I already know.

Anyway, all you nay-sayers might like to know that with a bit of fiddling, I got this set up the way I wanted and it works GREAT! Really well. I was amazed at how quick games still loaded. It doesn't work to well for anything modern with detailed textures, but for the 2D indie platformers and older games it works just fine.

I'm happy to detail the process to get it working if anyone is interested.

[Rove]

Please do tell. Next maybe you will get it so that it is actually run on the gaming rig but is streamed to the client notebook? That is the next step for better 3D performance.

[Forum Joe]

Hah, yeah, I'm tracking NVIDIA's streaming technology for that, I'm quite interested, but I think it's still a few years off.

Before I start, the usual disclaimer goes here that I make no promises this will not corrupt data somehow. I've been using it for a while and it works fine for me, but it should be obvious that this is NOT how Steam intended to function, and doing this method is at your own risk!

To get this working requires a 3rd party application called SteamTool (which I was using on the 3D gaming rig anyway). The complications arise because both SteamTool and Steam require an empty directory to point to as a remote library, and that SteamTool won't work on a network share.

1. On the 3D gaming rig, Create an empty folder where you want your steam library to be. If you already have a steam library, you will copy it into this folder later.

2. On the 3D gaming rig, share that folder, ensure that the user has read/write access (I won't go into details on how to do that here)

3. On the remote HTPC, connect to the remote sharepoint, map network drive, reconnect at login. Double check your Z: (or whatever) is the blank folder you created in step 1.

4. On the remote HTPC, install Steam, go to Steam Settings -> Downloads -> Steam Library Folders and tell it to create a new library on Z:

5. On the 3D gaming rig, install SteamTool, and set it to point to the empty folder (which won't be empty anymore) and to the subfolder SteamApps -> Common

6. On the 3D Gaming rig, use SteamTool to move any games you wish to share to the new folder. SteamTool manages the virtual links by itself, so this process is invisible to the Steam install on your gaming rig.

7. On the HTPC, it will still show zero games installed. However, if you go to install one that is already in the shared folder, and you tell it to install there, it will just detect the already existing game and not download it. It will link to it instead and it will work find.


Notes: I haven't tested setting the HTPC to offline mode and playing two games at once. It should be ok in theory, as long as the two games are different. I certainly wouldn't recommend playing the same game on both computers at once. But I will test it, for the sake of science!

Note 2: If you're already using SteamTool on the gaming rig, this process becomes a little more complex because you'll have to remap things to the new folder. You still have to go through steps 1-5, then manually copy the games to the folder, then relink each one in SteamTool. That took me about 10 minutes of clicking with a library of 160 games.

[Rove]

Here is a software that will let you actually properly stream but it costs money for the premium version and no gaurantee that it is 100% honest or good and malware and or or bug free.

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/stream-games-to-other-computers-with-streammygame/

Windows could make their home networking and Bluetooth so very much easier to use and customize and so on. I hope one day that software / media streaming is a built in taken for granted feature of Windows in the same way as the calculator.

On the other hand Windows 8 just took away all the free included games and made users go to the app store to download them and then offer premium paid versions of things like Pinball.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Originally posted by Rove:

On the other hand Windows 8 just took away all the free included games and made users go to the app store to download them and then offer premium paid versions of things like Pinball.

Yes but through the app store (much like Google Play) there are thousands of completely free-to-play games. Let alone other apps. Since when did we have such a thing on any previous build of Windows OS.

But keep in mind u don't have to stick to using Windows Store, u can use classic desktop and still install any normal apps u used to use in the past.

[Satoru]

The problem you're going to have is once you set one computer to offline mode, when the other computer 'touches' the game, the oflfline computer won't be able to play that game.

Take it into online mode, and you'll be at teh peril of which computer updates 'first' nad if you get into a run condition on the update, that's bad bad news.