Your image reminds me of old DOS 3.2 etc.
Failure to write a file gave options of Quit, Retry, Abort, etc,
but otherwise was un-informative as to the cause.
Often it would simply represent the options with no way out,
even Abort failed and the only way out was a reboot.
I suspect that steam.exe is doing something really dirty in the fundamentals, perhaps in the BIOS,
and Windows just cannot cope with it.
see
http://www.file.net/process/steam.exe.htmlThe fourth "User Comment " commences :-
"steam.exe prevents itself from being terminated by Task Manager. That's damn suspicious and antisocial;"
I suspect that On-Line shoot-em-up gamers ensure a level playing field by ensure that all responses in the game are from human interface devices, and not from a cheat automatic reaction assist program that can shoot the enemy even before the Graphics Adapter has shown where he is.
I suspect that it is a fundamental requirement that Steam should NOT be shut down when you want to cheat, and or if you manage to shut it down drastic action will be taken to penalise you or ensure that you gain no unfair advantage.
Consequently, even if you are not cheating, Steam will still protect itself,
and it will be far harder to kill steam.exe than it is to kill Notepad.exe.
n.b. If you Google "Steam.exe" you will get 731,000 results,
many of them referring to virus / malware.
I do not know if you have the "good" sort or the BAD sort ! ! !
Alan
