Is Steam the laggiest piece of software on your PC?

[futurefields]

Steam is routinely the laggiest piece of software I've ever used. Sometimes I click on something on the community or to look at a screenshot somebody posted and it wont even load until I click the link like 3 times. Meanwhile a youtube video or something in the background is streaming fine, I know my internet is working. Also the other day I was trying to browse stuff on the community and my computer just froze up.

 

[gothamhunter]

Nope.

 

[raasco]

Nope. I have an SSD. No lag here.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[Barfo]

Not by far.

 

[gdansk]

It has far too much latency in places it shouldn't. Though I don't get freezes.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[Newbian]

Sounds like connection issues with either the steam servers or yours for the link one.

Otherwise it is bloated if you just want to play games and not use it like a browser / game hub and would love some kind of streamlined version for gameplay use.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[sandorski]

I'm pretty sure it's just a web browser with webpages. It is a little laggy, but not so much that it bothers me. So I suppose the answer is Yes, but it's not because it's a bad piece of Software.

 

[gdansk]

What are you referring to?

As an example: if I start steam it updates, logs in, then starts to load the library. If I click the "gallery" view of my library it loads all the images (why aren't these cached?). Start up time is terrible even on my Intel 530...

 

[natto fire]

As an example: if I start steam it updates, logs in, then starts to load the library. If I click the "gallery" view of my library it loads all the images (why aren't these cached?). Start up time is terrible even on my Intel 530...

Huh, it does that for me too (downloads the images each time I switch to/from Grid view), but I prefer Small Mode anyways, unless I am hooked up to a TV/controller and then I just use Big Picture mode, which has usually worked great for me. I agree the built in browser can seem laggy, but you can still do most things for your account in a regular browser anyways.

No crashes or freezes here, on Windows 7 or 8.1, how many games are in your library?

 

[greenhawk]

Sounds like connection issues with either the steam servers or yours for the link one.

Otherwise it is bloated if you just want to play games and not use it like a browser / game hub and would love some kind of streamlined version for gameplay use.

closest option I have come across is set the game to start in small mode / games list. Has been working well for a while.

 

[greenhawk]

Sometimes I click on something on the community or to look at a screenshot somebody posted and it wont even load until I click the link like 3 times.

As most of steam is just a web interface (and a rather limited one at that), copying out the link and using your own web browser I find can be far faster than waiting for steam to do what it wants.

As to comparing steam/valve with youtube, I suspect youtube has a better server side data delivery system.

As to slow software, I have EA's game program is quite slow for what it does. Even going into a listing of the games I own can take several seconds.

The worst I remember thou is Apple's ITunes. I have refused to use it as it just good off into the woods at random times, even when looking at local files.

Another one was a earlier version of Samsungs KISS (?) software for their phones. Easier to just not bother.

 

[pauldun170]

Origin - meh
uplay - hate (Disappearing saved games)
Steam - No issues outside of damn update it does every time you start it up.

 

[surfsatwerk]

Nope.

+1

Never an issue offline or on.

 

[gothamhunter]

Also, for those of you looking for "Steam lite", try running it in "small mode", available under the view tab.

 

[imaheadcase]

Never had a issue with it.

 

[BrightCandle]

I don't think its a particularly well performing piece of software. The flash it has on the store screen going through games is actually pretty heavy on CPU usage and its not super slow switching between screens but it definitely doesn't feel snappy like a lot of other applications. A lot of it is web loaded and that explains the delays and somewhat poor performance sometimes.

The multiple click thing is usually a problem with Steam's website. When they get DDOSed or are under heavy load that does sometimes happen that pages don't load properly. Could be a local internet issue or something wrong with Steam when you tested it.

 

[darkewaffle]

Steam is definitely not one of the snappier pieces of software I use, not by a long shot. But most of the delay is at least confined to the shop or any/all web-based interaction, for the most part getting in and out of my library and such are usually fine.

 

[sweenish]

That honor goes to iTunes.

 

[PowerYoga]

nope.

 

[smackababy]

Considering I use Lotus Notes for work, no, nothing else can take the crown of "laggiest piece of software". That is the most POS, garbage, every developer who worked on it deserves to die crap I've ever used.

 

[Bateluer]

Not on my Haswell i5 machine or my AMD A6 1450 notebook machine.

 

[Spidre]

No, but I have an SSD.