Railworks America

Like many here, over the years I've collected a whole bunch of Train Sim dlc which is currently active on my desktop gaming rig. Today, I ordered a gaming laptop and would like to start with a clean slate, now that I've determined my favorite dlc's. I've done some searching but can't seem to find an answer to my specific concerns. So perhaps someone who's been through a similar process can offer some advice.

From what I've researched so far, everything I own should be listed on the new rig in my new Steam Library, with the option to selectively install only the games that I want on my new laptop, which is exactly the option I'm looking for. What I'm uncertain about, is if this same installation option will be available for all the individual dlc within Train Sim; or will all my dlc simply start installing automatically once I tell Steam to install the base game? I'd like to avoid having my entire dlc collection start automatically flooding onto my new rig, and then have to selectively uninstall the content I don't want.

I already know about copying the entire installation folder to an external drive and transferring, but I'd rather not risk dragging any unwanted or unnecessary files onto the new rig; just want to start fresh.

So ultimately, while using the same Steam account on both machines, I'd like to keep my bloated installation on the old rig, while installing a new streamlined version on the new rig, selecting only my favorite routes and rolling stock... if that's even possible.

Sorry for the long read; just trying to be clear on what I'm trying to achieve. Any advice please?

I don't think that's possible unless you put the new rig off line. Whatever you have for DLC's from Steam will just automatically D/L unless you uncheck them before you install the new set up. I hope that's clear. If you want to discuss further just holler.

Yes, I was afraid of that. I guess the only way around it would be to establish a new Steam account and re-purchase my favorite content. I guess that's one way to keep supporting our developers, so not necessarily a bad thing; just not cost-effective..well, at least not for me.

Either that, or set aside (copy-paste) a separate "bloated" installation folder (to be run from the exe), then strip-down my original "active" Steam-recognized folder to just my favorites, before I do the new laptop installation. Just becomes confusing when it comes to keeping multiple folders updated with new content; but that's another process entirely.

Thanks for your advice Buzz.

Would Store Them work. It is a program that is in the file library and it is listed in the board index. viewforum.php?f=52

Here's the thread explaining what StoreThem does: viewtopic.php?f=52&t=11410 I guess it's great if you already have a bloated installation and want to selectively load what's on your drive, but I'm trying to prevent a bloated installation from happening in the first place.

Again, I'm just trying to determine if I can "check the box" and d/l only the dlc I want on my new rig, using the same account credentials as my current rig. Unfortunately it appears that the dlc Steam "sees" installed / selected on my current rig, is exactly what it will install on my new rig when I install the base game. It's understandable I suppose. I can't expect a piece of software to differentiate between whats installed while using the same account on two different rigs. Actually, I guess it's a good thing in that it maintains our account settings across multiple platforms.

So it looks like I'll just let it install all my paid Steam dlc as we never know when a route will come along that utilizes something in our inventory. Either that, or start unchecking dlc on my current installation, although that will likely break some third party routes with dependencies. But at least I can still be selective when it comes to adding third-party content; I think that's what is bloating the majority of my installation anyway. I tend to be an assets hoarder, and a lot of stuff gets piled up that I'll never use. I think it'll be easier to just re-install the good stuff, or route-required stuff, rather than do a bulk installation of my assets folder and then try to weed out all the stuff that I don't want.

Once I get my new toy, I'll report back on what actually occurred during the TS Classic installation phase. Was just trying to get some insight before I take the plunge. Thanks!

So many repaints from multiple routes and other dependencies. Something may no longer work. I have 75 GB on my Railworks dedicated drive and it only takes about 20 seconds to get to the drive menu. Hopefully your new laptop has a spot for a good M.2 drive to store your Railworks folder on and a fast SSD with a good cache size.

If you are talking about Steam/DTG DLC you can untick what you don't want to install in Manage My DLC on the right-hand side of your Steam Trainsimulator library page.

AmericanSteam wrote:So many repaints from multiple routes and other dependencies. Something may no longer work. I have 75 GB on my Railworks dedicated drive and it only takes about 20 seconds to get to the drive menu. Hopefully your new laptop has a spot for a good M.2 drive to store your Railworks folder on and a fast SSD with a good cache size.

Actually, everything should work, as I do not have any third party content installed yet; hence no dependency requirements ..the entire "new" installation is straight off the Steam shelf. Next will come the arduous task of installing all the non-Steam content; but very selectively. For example, there are some routes that are otherwise nice, but come with some less than desirable assets that get installed in the process, and my original installation is cluttered with them. So this time around, rather than drag a bunch of pre-installed folders from my old install onto the new one; I'm going to install fresh out of the zip files. The only exception might be for loco and rolling stock repaints that require plucking the Geo-files from ap-files and such.

@ Trev: Thanks, that's what I was hoping to hear originally, but found out for myself as described below.

Anyways; the new laptop arrived: Acer Nitro 17 Gaming Laptop (17.3" QHD 165Hz @ 2560x1440, AMD 8-Core Ryzen 7 7840HS, 64GB DDR5, 2TB M.2 SSD, GeForce RTX 4060 8GB).

I'm happy to report that everything went well with the new installation. I did not make any changes to the existing installation before doing the setup on the new laptop, other than logging out of Steam. Here's what I did, step by step:

1. Started the laptop, logged into email so I could receive my Steam verification code once the time came. Installed Steam onto the new laptop, logged in and entered the code sent to email.

2. Went to my Library and observed all my games being present but not installed. Went to TS Classic and selected "manage my ### dlc" and saw that all my dlc had the boxes checked, ready for installation; this is apparently the default, as there were a few on my original installation that were unchecked. Going through my dlc list, I unselected everything I did not want on my new installation.

3. Returned to the game icon and selected "Install" and specified the location at the prompt; my laptop came with a 2TB ssd, partitioned in half for a C and D drive; I installed onto the D drive. A few hours and 149GB later, the installation was complete, and I did a "file verification" just to be sure everything installed without error.

Lastly, I needed to check my old rig to see if unchecking the dlc on the new rig had any effect on the original installation. I logged out of Steam on the laptop and logged into Steam on the original rig. Then went to TS Classic "manage my dlc" and all the original checked boxes remained just the same as when I started.

So, to answer my own question: Yes, you can do a streamlined installation on a new pc using the same user account without affecting a much larger installation on an existing pc. Just be careful to uncheck whatever dlc you don't want on the new rig before clicking the "install" button for the base game.

I hope this will relieve any doubts for anyone considering the same process. Thanks again to those who responded and tried to help