I fail to see the point of the steam backup option

I suspect the "backup" option is probably there to make it simple for people, or possibly a legacy of an early version (or original design spec) where it wasn't going to be quite so simple.

However given that you can simply copy the entire steam folder, it seems pretty pointless at the moment.
 
Werewolf said:
I suspect the "backup" option is probably there to make it simple for people, or possibly a legacy of an early version (or original design spec) where it wasn't going to be quite so simple.

However given that you can simply copy the entire steam folder, it seems pretty pointless at the moment.
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Preciely what I was thinking, it doesn't appear to introduce a massive amount of compression, and as far as I understand, it doesn't go into the documents folders and backup all your options, settings and save games.

Currently it is faster to copy to another location/drive, and then zip or rar the package to compress. Job done.
 
anti-drm/steam freaks cry if they can't have a hard copy that they can hide beneath their pillow at night, hence the option to create one
 
Souness said:
anti-drm/steam freaks cry if they can't have a hard copy that they can hide beneath their pillow at night, hence the option to create one
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So does backing up a hard copy prevent DRM install limits???????

like i said i didn't even think install limits existed on steam...
 
Guys the OP is talking about the game saves

bigjimmyauk said:
what i'd really like is a way to back-up all your steam game saves in one click considering if i want to back up my 13 games i have to hunt around the c drive to find them as they are never in the same place.
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Another use for the steam backup option would be if you were transfering your steam folder from PC A to PC B and only had a fat32 formatted drive to do it with, since there are some files over 4Gb.
 
Ace Modder said:
Surely you won't want to play all 200GB of games straight away when you re-install?
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No, but I like to have all my games accessible, so I can play whatever I fancy without having to wait. I have a LOAD of games picked up in the steam Xmas sale that I'm dancing between, and others from before and after.

Admittedly, if I did have to wait several hours or days to download a few games, I'd probably stick with one long enough to finish it. :)

Edit: spending less time on this forum would probably help too!
 
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Evilsod said:
You are aware that:
a) Downloading a 15gb game takes forever, i don't care how fast your connection is.
b) People have bandwidth restrictions.
c) If you need to format or whatever, downloading an ENTIRE folder of steam games will take days or weeks.
d) the official steam back-up option alloys you to combine the entire steam folder into 1 folder that can be seperated depending on the size of the media you want to store it on, though no-one uses it since its prone to crashing.
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A) No it doesn't I'm on 24Mb and downloading games is incredibly quick. A 15GB game would be done pretty quickly.

B) Some do, not everyone does though, and as an example, I don't.

C) Days, maybe, not weeks really though.

D) I don't store my Steam Folder on C any way

With my steam folder at 300GB, it'd be a pain to use Steam's own backup system.

If I had to, I'd just copy it to another drive.
 
bigjimmyauk said:
why is it there if the game can just be re downloaded anyway, unless there is something i'm missing.

what i'd really like is a way to back-up all your steam game saves in one click considering if i want to back up my 13 games i have to hunt around the c drive to find them as they are never in the same place.
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I don't think that's currently something you can do with current software.

However I can't see it being particularly hard.

You'd just need to create a database of games, and where what games store their save files.

Maybe it could be integrated into steam, we could get a petition going or something? I know I'd find it quite useful.
 
Souness said:
anti-drm/steam freaks cry if they can't have a hard copy that they can hide beneath their pillow at night, hence the option to create one
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The back up option isn't to make a hard-copy of the game, it simply copies the install contents to where ever you want it to be.
 
kylew said:
I don't think that's currently something you can do with current software.

However I can't see it being particularly hard.

You'd just need to create a database of games, and where what games store their save files.

Maybe it could be integrated into steam, we could get a petition going or something? I know I'd find it quite useful.
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agreed i would definately sign sick of going through app data and local plus a zillion other c: folders just to back up my game saves.

this is where ubi's cloud is a pretty good idea. Speaking of which i've played the new splinter cell everyday since thursday and not had a single problem yet.
 
kylew said:
A) No it doesn't I'm on 24Mb and downloading games is incredibly quick. A 15GB game would be done pretty quickly.
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Even assuming you can max your connection out both ISP and steam end that still the best part of 2 hours downloading, which ain't bad for 15gig but thats still quite awhile.
 
Rroff said:
Even assuming you can max your connection out both ISP and steam end that still the best part of 2 hours downloading, which ain't bad for 15gig but thats still quite awhile.
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When I download stuff from steam, I get a consistent 2.4-2.6MB/s

At 2.6MB/s, that's just over an hour and a half.

Not bad really.
 
Steam doesn't always max out your connection. At least not in Oz. On top of that no matter how fast your connex is, its not faster than my e-sata to external hdd connex. Also, my e-peeeeeeeeeeeeeen is super massive.
 
I backup all my Steam games with WinRAR, it's usually the first thing i do before i even play them. Most games compress very well (60-70% or original size) and it doesn't take all that long for most games. In total i have about 140gb of RAR archives on my RAID1 storage drive i think, probably i could go through and delete a load of them that i have no intention to replay, but i've got into the habit now and it's hard to break lol.

I've not tried the in-built utility in years, i just have no use for cd/dvd sized archives when i don't even use optical media any more really.
 
the back up option lets you burn each game to a disk with an installer iirc.

For people who like hardcopies.
 
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