Linux Mint, Steam Update Disk Write Issues

Lucian_Dragos · April 15

I have an odd issue with Steam on Linux Mint 22.3. I can install and play games just fine. However when a game needs to update I get a disk write error. It also seems to happen trying to move a game from the archive hard drive to the boot SSD. However I can uninstall/reinstall the game with no issue as a janky workaround. But that is clearly less then ideal.

P.S. The boot drive in encrypted, but smart reports healthy.

Electronics Wizardy · April 16

Can you show the specific error?

What permissions do you have to that stream folder? What filesystem?

Lucian_Dragos · April 16

3 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Can you show the specific error?

What permissions do you have to that stream folder? What filesystem?

Ext4 and all it tells me is disk write error in Steams downloads screen. Also not sure how to check the permissions, But like I said fresh installs work just fine. it seems to only be updates and moving games to the SSD that it hits a error.

Eigenvektor · April 16

33 minutes ago, Lucian_Dragos said:

Also not sure how to check the permissions,

You can just do a regular ls -la, you should see something like this in the output:

-rw-r--r--

This example means the user has read/write permissions, group and others have read permissions respectively

Kilrah · April 16

Yes most likely owner/permissions problem. Compare a copy to an install and apply the same on a copy as on the install.

y0ur5h4d0w · April 16

did you try to fire up a different distro and install steam to check if the issue isn't tied directly to mint? in my experience mint is an ~~awful~~ not so "stable" distro, and i mean about software working not sheer updates, everytime i gave mint a shot i had weird issues... (specifically audio for some reasons but not only that)

try to "replicate" your install in ubuntu or debian 13 and check if the issues exists there too, just to check if it's mint or a different issue

can you post a screenshot of the exact error? open up a terminal (ctrl + alt + t) and type "steam -d" then update a game, stop with ctrl +c when the error appear and post a pic of the terminal.