64bit Steam Client & Games for macOS 11

[ErniePC12]

Apple has announced that with macOS 11, they will begin to phase-out 32bit applications. This process should begin sometime in January 2018.

In checking my computer, I see that the Steam Client and the games it installs are all 32bit.

When will we start to see an update to the client and games?

[Gwarsbane]

The 64bit client doesn't matter, as it doesn't use more then 4 gigs of ram. All it does is launch games, and its up to the game devs/publishers to make their games 64bit, so go ask them. But seeing as how most games do not even come close to using 4 gigs of ram, don't count on them moving to 64bit any time soon.

Seriously, what would a 64bit steam be able to do for you, that a 32bit steam could not do?

[ErniePC12]

Gwarsbane님이 먼저 게시:

Seriously, what would a 64bit steam be able to do for you, that a 32bit steam could not do?

What would it be able to do under the new OS?

Launching would be just a start...

[DePhoegon]

Well.. Isn't that going to be sad for you? Though how many Mac Games are 64bit?
First off, I'm sure steam will make a 64 bit client when the OS launches & their old client won't launch.

Secondly, you baboon... the developers & Publishers, That's right... THOSE PEOPLE of their respective games HAVE TO PUT IN THE WORK TO MAKE IT 64bit.

Third, if the list of MacOS games that are 64bit, happens to be a tiny fraction of what's actually on offer, or near the single digits, there might be a chance that 64bit OS for Mac is SOL for a while, and suddenly a 64bit windows running in that parrellal mode of yours, will be your best friend. (as windows isn't likely to dump x86 support, until the CPU's no longer support it, and even then it'll take years & time for 32bit to not be used)

[aiusepsi]

Obviously there's nothing Valve can do directly about third-party games, but given that Apple are going to phase out 32-bit, getting moving on a 64-bit Steam client for macOS is not unreasonable. The overwhelming majority of software for Mac is 64-bit; out of the several hundred processes I currently have running, a grand total of 8 of them are 32-bit, and two of those are Steam. Even Steam's own webhelpers are 64-bit!

If Valve wanted to be even more proactive, they could warn developers currently only shipping 32-bit binaries for macOS that they ought to update.

ErniePC12님이 먼저 게시:

Apple has announced that with macOS 11, they will begin to phase-out 32bit applications. This process should begin sometime in January 2018.

It's probably going to be macOS 10.14, i.e. the next version after 10.13 High Sierra, which is when they'll apparently begin "aggressively warning" about 32-bit apps.

[ErniePC12]

What got me onto this was looking through the Application section in the System Information app on my computer. I was surprised to see that I still had a far amount of 32bit applications.

Now, some were from Apple, so I know those will get sorted out, but I really never gave it a thought that the games installed by Steam. Even the games that use some kind of wraper to port their Windows games over to the Mac were 32bit.

I would hate to see Apple come out with their 64bit only OS and see that Steam is lagging behind. This wouldn't be good for them, espically after they were recently showing off VR at WWDC.

Still, I'm sure it will happen, I just hope it will.

[Gwarsbane]

Yes it would be a real shame that Steam falls behind when less then 5 percent of 3 percent would be using a 64bit only OS....

http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
OSX 3.05% (this 9 versions of the OS)

That said. There is a UI update coming. What it contains, only Valve knows. We could be getting a 64bit version of the OS. Seriously the only reason for 64bit is to be able to access more then 2 gigs of ram (I thought it was 4, but its 2). There is almost no other reason to move to a 64bit software. OS yes, but software no.
https://www.howtogeek.com/194119/why-are-most-programs-still-32-bit-on-a-64-bit-version-of-windows/

Heck I still use some programs that are 16 bit. They are from the 90s, I use them because they do things far better and simpler then some of todays programs.

[n4b331]

Gwarsbane님이 먼저 게시:

The 64bit client doesn't matter, as it doesn't use more then 4 gigs of ram. All it does is launch games, and its up to the game devs/publishers to make their games 64bit, so go ask them. But seeing as how most games do not even come close to using 4 gigs of ram, don't count on them moving to 64bit any time soon.

Seriously, what would a 64bit steam be able to do for you, that a 32bit steam could not do?

A 64bit steam client would be able to utilize existing libraries on the host OS thereby reducing the installation size. I know this is true on Linux because installing steam there also installs quite a few 32 bit libraries which are already installed in their 64 bit form. This should also be true on macOS.

[aiusepsi]

n4b331님이 먼저 게시:

A 64bit steam client would be able to utilize existing libraries on the host OS thereby reducing the installation size. I know this is true on Linux because installing steam there also installs quite a few 32 bit libraries which are already installed in their 64 bit form. This should also be true on macOS.

It's not the same on macOS; macOS has fat binaries which contain both 32 and 64-bit code. For example, the output of "file /usr/lib/libstdc++.6.0.9.dylib" is:

/usr/lib/libstdc++.6.0.9.dylib: Mach-O universal binary with 2 architectures: [x86_64: Mach-O 64-bit dynamically linked shared library x86_64] [i386: Mach-O dynamically linked shared library i386]
/usr/lib/libstdc++.6.0.9.dylib (for architecture x86_64):	Mach-O 64-bit dynamically linked shared library x86_64
/usr/lib/libstdc++.6.0.9.dylib (for architecture i386):	Mach-O dynamically linked shared library i386

This is actually one reason that a future version of macOS is likely to dump 32-bit support entirely: it means that every binary in the OS will halve in size.

[myxal]

ErniePC12님이 먼저 게시:

What would it be able to do under the new OS?
Launching would be just a start...

I'm not sure what you meant by "macOS 11", but yeah - it's January 2018, and the first steps of the 32-bit phase-out are here: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/01/apple-prepares-macos-users-for-discontinuation-of-32-bit-app-support/

[timeimp]

This is the error message you see when starting steam under macOS 10.13.4: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1283113501

[FuzzyPuffin]

The 32-bit phase out is for the store only right now. In 10.3.4 (see above) you get a dialog the first time you start a 32-bit app.

I expect in 10.14 you'll get that dialog all the time instead of once (like in iOS 10) and 10.15 will finally kill support. Valve has a while.

[ErniePC12]

I know Valve has time, but let us all remember Valve Time...

This being said, while Valve has to update their apps, all the other developers have to update their binaries as well.

I started this thread in June after Apple's WWDC. I knew that this would all come around, I would have thought that some might start working on it sooner rather than later.

I guess we can revisit this again in 6 months and see how things are progressing...

[FuzzyPuffin]

ErniePC12님이 먼저 게시:

I know Valve has time, but let us all remember Valve Time...

This being said, while Valve has to update their apps, all the other developers have to update their binaries as well.

If you are expecting most games to get updates, I think you'll be disappointed.

[ErniePC12]

FuzzyPuffin님이 먼저 게시:

If you are expecting most games to get updates, I think you'll be disappointed.

Why do you say that?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

ErniePC12님이 먼저 게시:

FuzzyPuffin님이 먼저 게시:

If you are expecting most games to get updates, I think you'll be disappointed.

Why do you say that?

It will be up to the developers for to provide 64-bit executables for their games. Most probably won't bother with it.