How to move a Steam game from HDD to SSD

SteamMover does it for you by using junction points. I regularly use it to move games that take longer to load onto my SSD.
 
Why would you use a 3rd party app with junction points which could break at any time with a Windows Update when Steam now does the move with the client itself? :confused:
 
For the past 10+ years I've simply copied the steam folder and ran steam.exe from the new destination. What does steam mover do thats so special?
 
All I do is cut and paste the game from the drive it's on to the drive I want it on. Then click uninstall on the game in the steam library. Then click install again - select the drive you've just moved it to and Steam will then say 'detecting existing game files' and that's it done.
 
Also if you already have a game downloaded you cant move it using the Steam client unless you know better. You can choose different steam libraries when you install a game (folders) if you have them setup but not when a game has already downloaded. Its a quick dirty app that solves a problem when your Steam drive is fit to bursting.

If you do a manual copy of the whole Steam folder to a different drive letter it loses where they are till you verify game again. On my boys PC I did a manual copy and then had to click on Install for each game to locate the game files. No downloading was done.
 
Thats not moving games with the steam client though. I have had it where the manual method didnt work and I had to download the game as it deleted the downloaded files.

Open Steam Mover, click on game you want to move, click go. Done. Simple.

Its whatever works best for you. However saying that since I setup libraries I dont use Steam Mover anymore as I have two masoov drives for my Steam Libraries, One SSD, One HDD ;)
 
weldon855 said:
ah lads some of you should have watched the video before commenting about copy/paste/uninstall and steam mover.......
Click to expand...

I think there are several processes going on though.

The video shows how to move a single game within the Steam Client to a new folder/hard drive. Fair enough one way of doing for 1 or 2 games but if you are moving a lot I can see it becoming a bit tiresome.
Steam Mover - with this app you can just tick all the games you want to move then click go - easier to do multiple games 15+ or whatever.
The above are more to do with creating space or moving to a faster drive.

To move your whole Steam install you cant do that with the video instruction. As in if you want to migrate from hdd to a ssd. Then remove the hdd. The manual options have been mentioned above.

Worthy of the OP highlighting it, probably not worth debating as much as we did. :)
 
weldon855 said:
ah lads some of you should have watched the video before commenting about copy/paste/uninstall and steam mover.......
Click to expand...

You should probably have tried SteamMover before making your comment. I watched the video, and posted my suggestion to SteamMover because the way it's done in the video through Steam is clunky as hell. I would still use Steam Mover in every situation. I have two libraries setup and it's simple to install new games to the library, but moving them through Steam takes a load of unnecessary clicks through options and as mentioned above, you cannot move multiple games with a single click. SteamMover allows you to do this and it's really easy. It shows you a list of games installed in your main library, and you can just click on each game you want to move and then click the button to move them all at once.

As for the comment about junction points breaking, I've never suffered this issue, through update or not. They used to be symbolic links many years ago and now junction points have taken over, and I've been using SteamMover for years (Windows 7 up to Windows 10) and it hasn't ever been a problem for me. Steam Mover also allows you to move games back into your main steam library when you've finished playing them. As mentioned, I move the games I'm currently playing onto my SSD so that the access is better for those games. I wouldn't want to have to click through several menu options within Steam, for each game when I want to do that.
 
I used to use SteamMover but stopped when it started breaking games. Well, it's more that the games didn't work until I moved them back. I think it was just Blizzard games that it didn't work with, but it was enough.
Now I just use the Steam client method for steam games and do Blizzard (and others) games manually.
 
CHokKA said:
You should probably have tried SteamMover before making your comment.
Click to expand...

why?

CHokKA said:
Steam Mover also allows you to move games back into your main steam library when you've finished playing them. As mentioned, I move the games I'm currently playing onto my SSD so that the access is better for those games. I wouldn't want to have to click through several menu options within Steam, for each game when I want to do that.
Click to expand...

I have 2 steam games on my ssd at the moment and the rest on hdd.I swap them around using the method in steam client. Or If I buy a new game.
OP shows the best way to move A game from one drive to another in roughly 5 clicks if you want to count them. No third party exe or junction points required.

As already mentioned above by varkonoid if you are moving a catalogue of games then that's a different story.
And I still would not use steam mover for that either.
 
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