Red's Box

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10/09/2011

Steam Double Duty

Post by Unknown |

While downloading Shogun 2 on my desktop and installing some Torchlight mods on my laptop today I found a neat trick. It has to do with downloading a game via Steam on one computer and playing a game (or downloading, chatting with friends, etc) on a second computer via Steam using the same account. It can be done with minimal hassle which I will detail below the break.


1. On the computer, "first" computer, you plan to just download (not play) games on go ahead and start downloading whatever games you want and leave it running (to the download screen if you want to monitor). Be sure to start all downloads at once because in order to add new games to the download queue you will have to restart this entire process.

2. Start Steam on your other, "second" computer.

3. Even if you have Steam set to auto log-in It will ask you to enter your password because you are already logged in elsewhere. Do it and Steam should start normally.

4.Now observe on the first computer that the "You've been logged out" prompt asking you to log back in appears, however your games continue to download in the background. Don't hit "cancel" or Steam exits and don't log back in or it will log you out on the second computer. If you left the first computer on the download monitor screen you can review their progress as you normally would, but you can't otherwise interact with Steam.

5. Enjoy playing a game on your second computer while downloading on your first!



I haven't verified that this works on Mac, but I imagine it will behave similarly.

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