Moving Steam to another HD

[Blakeb155]

Okay, so with the release of Episode 1 getting closer it in unlikely that my current HDD will have enough memory left for it.

Luckily I have another one. what I need with is, How do I move my entire Steam directory onto my secondary HDD? Is there any special steps that must be taken?

 

[UltimaApocalypse]

Half Life 2 Aftermath will be a stand alone game.

 

[Blakeb155]

Yeah, but it will probably take up a few GB and I don't have the space.

 

[Shasta]

If you have the space to put HL2 on another HD, then why don't you just put Episode 1 on that instead? Then there is no mucking around.

If you want to do it the long way, just click "backup steam files" in steam. Then re-install HL2 etc on your other HD, and restore the backed up files. Then wipe the lot from it's original place. Just make sure you know your steam account name / password etc, or it will not work.

 

[Blakeb155]

If you have the space to put HL2 on another HD, then why don't you just put Episode 1 on that instead? Then there is no mucking around.

If you want to do it the long way, just click "backup steam files" in steam. Then re-install HL2 etc on your other HD, and restore the backed up files. Then wipe the lot from it's original place. Just make sure you know your steam account name / password etc, or it will not work.

sorry I'm a bit of a n00b on this issue, so its possible to install aftermath on another HDD while the rest of my steam directory is on my original HDD (the one with the OS on it)

All I'm worried about is the HDD that I am using ATM for steam and all its games has only about 1-2GB left, which is probably not enough for Aftermath.

 

[kupocake]

sorry I'm a bit of a n00b on this issue, so its possible to install aftermath on another HDD while the rest of my steam directory is on my original HDD (the one with the OS on it)

I don't think this is an option.

All I'm worried about is the HDD that I am using ATM for steam and all its games has only about 1-2GB left, which is probably not enough for Aftermath.

I'd say that you're actually over-estimating the space that Aftermath will take up, given that it will share materials with Half-Life 2. The local, HL2-specific files are only 841mb themselves. Also I can't really see why you just can't move some of the other stuff on your full-HDD to the one with space on, bearing in mind the hassle that moving Steam entails.

Possible courses of action:

1) According to instructions on the Steam support page, I think you can just copy and paste your steam directory and some specific registry stuff. Unfortunatly, I can't access support right now to verify this. EDIT: Here it is

2) Simply uninstall Steam, and reinstall it on the other HDD and redownload your stuff / reinstall via backups / retail CDs (obviously, this is rather time consuming).

3) Move Something else to the other HDD or to Blank Media or even a removable disc like an iPod.

4) Delete Half-Life 2 to make way for Episode 1, because Episode 1 doesn't require Half-Life 2 to be installed.

 

[Shasta]

I'd say that you're actually over-estimating the space that Aftermath will take up, given that it will share materials with Half-Life 2. The local, HL2-specific files are only 841mb themselves. Also I can't really see why you just can't move some of the other stuff on your full-HDD to the one with space on, bearing in mind the hassle that moving Steam entails.

Possible courses of action:

4) Delete Half-Life 2 to make way for Episode 1, because Episode 1 doesn't require Half-Life 2 to be installed.

Those two things contradict each other, so which is it? If it shares stuff with HL2, then you would need HL2 installed, right? So if that was correct, you couldn't say to "uninstall HL2 because Episode 1 doesn't require HL2 to be installed". Could you?

Now common understanding (and this could be wrong- it is just what most people agree on) is that Episode 1 will not require an installed or previously owned copy of HL2. But- we don't seem to know for certain.

 

[kupocake]

Look in the Steam-apps directory and you'll see what I mean. Shared Source Engine materials and Half-Life 2 are seperate archives. By deleting Half-Life 2 through the Steam interface, you only delete the HL2 specific content, which I expect will be matched in size by the new Episode 1-specific material.