Steam being troublesome

[AHadley]

I decided I would resurrect my copy of Half-Life 2 this morning and launched Steam, only to find that whatever I did it wouldn't recognise a connection to the Steam network. I've run through everything on the Steam website that relates to my issues, nothing. I googled for a bit, and all hits pointed to a complete reinstallation. So I uninstalled Steam and all the games I had on it (The Orange Box, Codename Gordon, Garry's Mod, HL2DM, Minerva, Missing Information and SMod) and reinstalled Steam.

Now, every time I launch Steam, it says 'Steam.exe (Main Exception): Unable to load library 'steam.dll''. I downloaded a dll from the net (something I don't like doing) and this time it did the same with steamui.dll. Downloaded that one, still the same error. I found an image of somebody's clean Steam folder and there was a hell of a lot missing from mine. The problem, in that case, was fixed by the guy sending his steam installation over (minus Steamapps).

1.- Has anybody else had this problem and fixed it? What do I do?

2.- Is there any chance one of you guys could send me your Steam folder, minus your own games?

[GSH]

Re-download Steam from the official source, not some pirated DLLs. Look at http://store.steampowered.com/about/ .

-- GSH

[AHadley]

I've done that half a dozen times already, to no luck...

[General BlackDragon]

question asked more then what color shirt your wearing: Are you running Vista?

[AHadley]

XP:MCE.

Here are the contents of my Steam installation folder.

I had something similar once when half the files installed to C:\Program Files\Valve\Steam rather than C:\Program Files\Steam. It's not that this time.

[Warfreak]

It's not installing all the way it looks. Also SINCE WHEN DOES IT HAVE A SUPPORT PAGE ?!?

@GBD and anyone else who asks that question: Vista isn't as much of a piece of hoot that people who dont know how to do stuff make it look like. If you know how to do stuff, you can get around ALOT of the crap it throws your way. That and i've NEVER had problems with games on Vista that I couldnt debug in less than 10 seconds.

[AHadley]

I know it's not installing properly, that's the problem, damn thing.

Would anybody be able to isolate which core files are missing and send them to me somehow? Is there something else I can do?

[Warfreak]

Thats the thing, you are missing EVERY file that it needs to install. Run as Admin, install to an area besides program files, SOMETHING that makes sure it installs.

[AHadley]

I am an admin, but I'll see what I can do about the second part.

EDIT: Just had a thought. It does something similar with the Windows Installer Database, are there any registry keys that indicate that the files I am missing are in place?

[GSH]

Let me be clearer: DO NOT COPY DLLS LIKE THIS. Steam changes these DLLs every revision. If you install DLLs half from one version, and half from another, you're going to make a 'frankenbuild' that's really buggy and unsupported. Whatever problems you had, you've just squared them by doing stupid stuff like copying DLLs. As much as you think you're "solving" a problem, you're not. You're trying to paper over the real problem, and making more problems for yourself down the road. Only a few DLLs should ever be copied around, and you've got to know that such an operation is safe before you do that.

Frankly, you've got enough of a clue to be dangerous. Really dangerous. You've been handed a loaded gun, and are unloading the clip in the general direction of your feet. If you're going to do stupid stuff like this, your PC users license should be revoked. Go use a console. Or a mac, if you're going to do this.

Steam gave me issues when I tried to install it to c:\program files\games\steam . I like having my games under a subfolder in Program Files, as opposed to c:\program files\<Obscure name of publisher|developer>\<game name>. But, as it gave me flack, I let it use the defaults (i.e. c:\program files\steam ), and it's been happy since then.

-- GSH

[AHadley]

There are no dlls in the install, that is the problem... it just keeps reinstalling the same files...

I tried installing it to my desktop, and that installed the same files and folders. I might as well have copied the folder over.

Back to the original question. Does anybody have the core files I need from an up-to-date build? Or would that cause the problems GSH is describing?

[Warfreak]

*headdesk*, For Christ sake GET A NEW INSTALLER FROM THE STEAM WEBSITE.

If it WONT install correctly the one you have is crap, so get another one from the official source.

[Nielk1]

#1, only EVER get steam installers and files from the official site. Incorrect DLLs can be modified for cheating and get you VAC BANNED.

#2, OEM MSstyle I see. Still haven't hacked the theme DLL for customs I guess.

#3, Seriously, get the OFFICIAL Steam installer from the OFFICIAL site. Anything else is just ridiculous.

[AHadley]

1) I am using a steam installer from the official site.

2) I have, I have the same Zune style you use, I just like this one.

3) I've got it and am using it!

[Nielk1]

(I actually use a blue Ubuntu style now, only with an MS logo of course.)