Resolver Overload (continuation)

[kisak-valve]

Since the number of DNS queries during updates was significantly reduced for #3401, I've decided it would be best to split off the single report and see if we can gather more insight on scenarios where DNS throttling is still triggered.

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On 2017-04-01 @fuglede commented at https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux/issues/3401#issuecomment-290956835:

@kisak-valve: Tried three different mirrors over the course of 20 minutes, and after a brief period of being able to download, I would get stuck at some ~50kB/s. After having tried with the third mirror, I set dnsmasq, and the moment I changed the resolver in /etc/resolv.conf (without restarting Steam), I would jump up to the expected ~2MB/s and remain there since.

[karolherbst]

it's still an issue and some DNS servers are alergic to so many requests. Why would any application even want to do that many DNS queries?

[deathlyrage]

Still having this issue, temp hack fix by using a local dns caching solution with dnsmasq.

[TheTuxGamer]

I too still have this issue on multiple machines running Linux Mint 19.1 Cinnamon

[arytix]

Issue still persists. Usging a VPN Service also solves the issue for me. Why can this bug not be resolved after more than a decade.

[ryazo]

Issue still persists. Usging a VPN Service also solves the issue for me. Why can this bug not be resolved after more than a decade.

Haven't you heard of Valve Time?

Using tcpdump, it looks like it is making a new DNS request every tenth of a second or less? If Valve can't fix this issue, can't they use static ips for game content instead?

Think I might set up a pi-hole just to deal with this.

[sunmachine]

Chiming in. Experiencing this issue on Mint Cinnamon 19.1.

[h1z1]

Maybe related, was able to trigger this on a host that lost network access (laptop). Kind of odd considering the TTL on those records should be at least 3 hours

cm1-iad1.cm.steampowered.com. 10800 IN  A   162.254.192.100

Funny thing is steam will remember whatever nodes it finally is able to latch onto rather then using the configured region. Completely forgot I override dns on steam hosts, only noticed going from home to office. Ethernet was plugged into a cell modem but the data was turned off thus it had a link but no net access.

[mvanderkamp]

This is still a problem! Experiencing it on Ubuntu 18.04. dnsmasq as a workaround seems to have some sort of conflict with other services and ends up torching the network, still working on how to fix that, but it would be really nice if steam behaved properly and didn't cause this issue in the first place!

[Arbitrate3280]

Just wanted to say that this is still an issue. The dnsmasq workaround didn't work for me. Am now using Windows with Steam for the time being.

[v2absolutely]

Just adding my pinch of salt here: I recently installed Kubuntu 20.04 and installed Steam straight from the software store and had this issue. Kubuntu comes with dnsmasq by default, and in the last issue thread, I saw that one fix was to add "nameserver 127.0.0.1" to /etc/resolv.conf, then restarting Network-Manager. This was a good work-around for my issue, but when I looked back at resolv.conf, the addition I made was removed automatically. My speeds are still stable, but I know that if I restart my PC, this change may be reverted. I don't see this as a solution, but a workaround. Is there any chance anyone knows what I can do that's a more permanent solution?

[slondr]

I also experience this issue, setting up dnsmasq solved it as a workaround.

[Coolguy3289]

Experiencing this issue as of a couple weeks ago, have a windows PC in my network and issue is not present:

Steam Version:  1702079146
Steam Client Build Date:  Thu, Dec 7 7:33 PM UTC -08:00
Steam Web Build Date:  Fri, Dec 8 6:30 PM UTC -08:00
Steam API Version:  SteamClient021

OS: Arch Linux Kernel: Linux MYARCHGAMER 6.6.2-arch1-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Mon, 20 Nov 2023 23:18:21 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux

I've tried installing dnsmasq and pointing my DNS resolving to it locally with no change in speed on the Steam download.

[PadTrick]

also having this issue. on W11 i can download with over 500mbit\s on archlinux,ubuntu,linux mint its max. 250mbit\s really annoying

[YoinkerBoinker]

I've tried installing dnsmasq and pointing my DNS resolving to it locally with no change in speed on the Steam download.

Same here on EndouverOS. Didn't see any improvement. Only the steam_dev.cfg workaround added some speed. But still nowhere as fast as on Windows. It's insane that this isn't fixed.

[mzryz]

I want to add to this: I am using Arch (Manjaro) Linux and Steam is also overloading my DNS server. I use Pihole as my DNS server on my network, steam overloads & crashes it during downloads. I have to SSH into my Pihole every minute or so to reboot the DNS server in order to keep downloading, very frustrating.

[Coolguy3289]

I want to add to this: I am using Arch (Manjaro) Linux and Steam is also overloading my DNS server. I use Pihole as my DNS server on my network, steam overloads & crashes it during downloads. I have to SSH into my Pihole every minute or so to reboot the DNS server in order to keep downloading, very frustrating.

I was actually going to set up a PiHole to see if that would help mitigate the issue since I'm running Mikrotik as my router and figured its DNS was being overloaded. RIP that plan!

[abelsromero]

For reference I am having the same issues with pihole (my fix is disabling pihole during downloads), the amount of DNS requests is quite high, compared to normal traffic.

For reference, proof pihole is blocking

And the monitoring when downloading a game. the spike are obvious.

[brokkr]

Probably doesn't add much but I began seeing this today using a fresh install of EndeavourOS (switched from Manjaro). Never seen anything like it before. Stats very similar to @abelsromero only with peaks of up to 1800 3500. Sites queried are all cache[X]-ams1.steamcontent.com.

I started getting DNS refusals while downloading before I had set up NetworkManager to use my PiHole. Figured the solution was to set it touse it. It didn't change anything other than making it easier to tell what was happening, i.e. rate limiting. PiHole's RATE_LIMIT had kicked in at 1000/60. Setting/disabling RATE_LIMIT to 0/0 'fixed' it.

[brokkr]

Just to make explicit what others have been hinting at: Throttling download speeds seems to help a whole lot with the number of queries generated.

The drop around 13:15 and onwards is due to enabling Limit download speed and setting limit in kilobit speed per second to 80,000 (down from somewhere between 320,000 and 360,000 when unregulated).

Before that I tried disabling Game Transfer over Local Network to no effect (not that there were other hosts on the network offering anything).

[AsaTheUncle]

I am also affected on Manjaro 24.0.2. Tried setting up dnsmasq to no avail. Getting rate limited on my pi-hole because of this.

[heleos]

Also having this problem with Arch during large steam downloads. Rate limited by pi-hole.

I bumped my rate limit up and then it immediately jumped up to 6000. I installed dnsmasq and configured it for local caching and it's temporarily fixing the issue

[ri0t]

Aaah, now it got me, too! The pihole was very unhappy about it and shut me completely off, too.