Question Disk activity while decompressing

[Sajlenty]

For the past few months, I've been encountering unusual problems when downloading games on Steam. Despite having a 1 gigabit per second (gbps) network connection, Steam's download speed consistently remains at 50-60 megabytes per second (MB/s). This discrepancy doesn't seem to be related to my overall network speed, as other platforms and Ookla speed tests use the full bandwidth.

When examining the download graph, it appears that Steam often waits for disk activity, leading to blank Network columns. I've confirmed that Steam has the capability to use my entire bandwidth, but it requires specific steps and is not a permanent solution.

Two observations stand out:

1. After a PC reboot, the download speed reaches its maximum for about a minute.
2. Following a Steam reinstallation, the download speed was at its peak until I turned off my PC and restarted it after a few hours.

I've conducted tests on all three of my drives using CrystalDiskMark, and they perform at or near their rated speeds. However, Steam downloads are a bit slower to the SATA drive compared to the M.2 NVME drives.

My RAM is set to its advertised speed of 3600MHz and is stable.

I don't believe there's a hardware issue, and it doesn't seem related to Steam download settings. This problem is unique to Steam and doesn't occur with other launchers. Additionally, my Steam Deck, when using WiFi, downloads faster than my wired-connected PC.

I'm unsure about the extent to which other launchers decompress files, making it challenging to pinpoint the root cause. It seems like there might be an issue with SSDs/CPU decompressing files, although the problem temporarily disappeared after reinstalling Steam. Could there be BIOS settings affecting drive speed or conflicting with Steam?

 

[rgd1101]

full system spec?
how full is the ssd?

 

[Sajlenty]

full system spec?
how full is the ssd?

I am running i7-12700KF, 32GB RAM, Z690 GAMING X DDR4, 3600MHz Kingston Fury RAM, Windows 11 and RTX 4080.

One SSD is about halfway full, the other one is only filled at like 10%.
I have confirmed so far that the downloads are at its peak without any interruptions every time after I reinstall Steam and they go back to around 50-60 after I reboot my PC.

EDIT: I have managed to solve the issue entirely by setting Steam.exe priority to Above Normal, High, or Real Time. It fixes it instantly. But why is it behaving like that? Maybe Windows is limiting something for Steam or Steam has trouble accessing my PC resources?