Steam – Backup Steam and Origin Games before full system format

originsteam

I'm planning to do a full format of my system this month in order to install Linux for programming purposes.

But I have 4 games installed, Skyrim from Steam and Mass Effect from Origin. Both of them with every DLC I could afford.

All my stuff, since always, are in another partition and all the paths properly adjusted in both DRM Managers.

Despite the Saved Games which I have to backup manually, I would like to know if this is enough to preserve the games' files themselves without download them again.

My main concern is about Mass Effect Trilogy (~40GB). I have a 10MB connection link and from Steam I can download at 800~1200kbps, so Skyrim (~11GB) wouldn't be a problem. But Origin is extremely slow, downloading from 50~300kbps.

Thank you in advance.

Best Answer

For the Steam part of your question, you have two options:

  1. Use Steam's built in "Backup" functionality, as outlined here.
  2. Just copy the contents of the steamapps folder, and Steam should only need to download a relatively small amount on the new machine, as outlined here.

See also this article on the Steam support site, which pretty much uses the second method above - it's about moving from one location to another on the same PC, but it should apply equally to moving computers.

I can't help with the Origin side, I'm afraid.

Related Topic