It did work, he's just never done it before so he didn't know what to expect.  There is a brief, often unnoticeable (provided a fast enough internet connection), download and file verification process after the copy is complete.  In his case it took a couple minutes.  I've been using this method for years, and it has never failed.  Your "better method" is functional identical.  How is that better?  The process of starting the install and interrupting it needs only occur in order to create the requisite folder structure on the target drive.  There's no risk in this, and it's actually quite ingenious since it gets Steam to do virtually all the work for you.  

6 hours ago, TechguyMaxC said:

It did work, he's just never done it before so he didn't know what to expect.  There is a brief, often unnoticeable (provided a fast enough internet connection), download and file verification process after the copy is complete.  In his case it took a couple minutes.  I've been using this method for years, and it has never failed.  Your "better method" is functional identical.  How is that better?  The process of starting the install and interrupting it needs only occur in order to create the requisite folder structure on the target drive.  There's no risk in this, and it's actually quite ingenious since it gets Steam to do virtually all the work for you.  

Well, I believe I did all by the book :-)

I had installed FSW at the fast internet link PC. Then I did two things, one of them I don't even know how to use in the future because I can't find any option to restore a game backup for FSW.

1) I did, through the Steam menu, a game backup, which created 25 folders under a "Backups" folder in teh default "C:\Program Files(x86)\Steam" folder;

2) I then installed FSW into the G: partition of that PC, on a SteamLibrary folder I asked to be created there, and when the game finished installing I copied the whole "FSW" folder under

the "Common" folder into an external disk;

3) At the other PC, with the slow internet connection, I installed Steam, then started the FSW installation, creating a "SteamLibrary" folder under an F: partition I have in that PC;

4) As Steam started downloading teh game files, and let it go for about 5 min and checked that the "Common\FSW" folder had already been created, although it was still empty, because the files, as usual, were being first downloaded into the other folder under the "SteamLibrary" one... 

5) After 5 min I interrupted the install, by Pausing the download, then closed Steam, and rebooted the PC - Steam was configured even not to start with Windows startup;

6) When the system was back up, I copied my external disk contents of FSW into the F:\...\Common\FSW dolder, which was still empty before that, and when the copy finished, I strated Steam, and then hit the FSW tab to start the game, which started the content download prcess again. It was showing 2hrs to go, and the packed files were being stored at the this PC's transfer folder for the Steam install... After 10 minutes of download, it was still announcing near 2hrs to finish, an the packed files continued to be downloaded to that area....  

I thn decided to wipe the contents of the FSW folder under "common" and waited for the install to terminate... It installed the full game again...

--> I also wonder for what is worth the "backup" I did using the Backup Game option, which created those 25 folders.... I could I restore that backup ?

There's your problem.  You paused the download.  If you go back to my instructions, I did not say to do that.  In doing so, you essentially told Steam to continue with the download regardless of whether or not it needed to.  

Anyway, live and learn.  Hope you enjoy FSW.  I haven't put much time into it yet myself, busy with other things but the pace of updates is very encouraging.

Incredible ! That must be it - and believe me I did think about it before hitting the Pause button :-/

Thanks again for your support - it could have made it a lot faster and save some additional bandwidth to my internet provider ... :-)

22 hours ago, TechguyMaxC said:

 

The problem is doing what you suggested, since you can't "cancel" an install. You can only interrupt it. Even if you click the "x" box after pausing, the install process remains in the queue and Steam may try to continue it.  The only way to fully cancel a download/install is to use the delete local content option in Steam, which will remove the folders you just had it create.  If you start an install and download, then interrupt it, then move files around, THAT is when you can confuse Steam.

That is the functional difference in our methods. My version doesn't start a Steam process you don't want started until you have all the files in place. My version prevents precisely the thing that happened in this case. 

I'm sorry you got your feelings hurt by my correction of your more problematic method.  The only part of your method I was trying to correct was just that one problematic step.  The step that caused a problem in this specific case.

I have almost 150 Steam games on six different drives on two computers and move different games often to make space. Doing it your way on a couple of occasions has caused problems. Doing it my way never does. 

For the sake of others who may read this after searching for how to do this, let me say again, creating the folders you need is easy. Getting Steam to do it by starting and stopping an install process introduces unnecessary variables that can create issues. You decide which method you would prefer to try. 

Why are you still posting about this?  It's done.  It was done yesterday.  There is nothing "problematic" about my method if you follow the instructions precisely.  If you are baking an apple pie and you insert an extra step you will still end up with an apple pie, it will just take longer.  This is precisely what happened to the OP.  Your assertion otherwise indicates you don't understand the inner workings of Steam or its method of software installation.  

Steam will not redownload all the files using my method, UNLESS you do as the OP did and pause the install prior to quiting Steam.  Using my method, Steam does a file verification of the contents of the game install directory in order to ascertain whether or not files need to be downloaded.  Its a feature of the Steam client designed to save bandwidth for Valve's game servers.  Why download GB of files if you don't have to?  

You did the hard way actually. Steam backup and restore is core feature on Steam. It´s very simple. You don´t have to start a new download on the second computer. There´s an option on Steam to restore a game, just click there and point to steam where are the files you backed up. 

Look:https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?s=3128fbe27e0dfd3ee4a6f385ee8c3047&ref=8794-YPHV-2033&l=english

 

Creating Backup Files

1. Right-click the game in the Library section
2. Select Backup game files...
3. Check the boxes for any other games to backup at this time
4. Click Next >
5. Browse to the folder where you wish to create the backup files (the files will be stored in c:\program files\valve\steam\Backups by default) and click Next >
6. Select the Backup file name and set the File size for the media you plan to use.
7. Click Next > to begin the backup process.
8. Once complete, choose Open backup folder  to move or burn copies of the backup files

 

Restoring from Backup Files

1. Install Steam and log in to the correct Steam account (see Installing Steam for further instructions)
2. Launch Steam
3. Click on "Steam" in the upper left corner of the Steam application
4. Select "Backup and restore games..."
5. Select "Restore a previous backup"
6. Browse to the location of the game's backup files
7. Continue through the Steam windows to install the necessary games.

 

About the number of files created, there´s a step to choose the size of each file, just type a lot of 9´s like that: "9999999". Steam will understand you have enough space and will create only one folder to your game. This is used for people saving in CD´s or DVD´s (not a lot of space).

Thank you @ca_metal - we're always learning!