Steam client version (build number or date): 1782866176 (stable, fresh reinstall 2026-07-08)
Distribution: Fedora 44 (kernel 7.1.3)
Opted into Steam client beta?: No (issue occurred on both beta and stable)
Have you checked for system updates?: Yes
Steam Logs: attached (see below)
GPU: AMD (RX 7900 / RADV, Mesa 26.0.3)
Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:
Expected: client stays connected and responsive.
What happens: since ~June 29 the client engine freezes in exact 54-second cycles (84 s on other days). Console repeats steamengine.cpp (2838): Assertion Failed: CSteamEngine::BMainLoop appears to have stalled > 15 seconds without event signalled. The UI goes unresponsive, CM heartbeats are missed, and I get Disconnected By Remote Host / NO CONNECTION loops with downloads at 0 bps. Games themselves launch and run fine.
Not the environment: this survives a full client purge + reinstall, multiple kernel versions, and a Mesa downgrade; during a freeze, curl from the same machine reaches the same CM hosts in milliseconds.
strace during a freeze shows the cause: the IPC:CSteamEngin thread sits in a blocking recv() on a single IPC socket for 33–41 s (until the peer closes it, recv returns 0), and while it's blocked the main loop receives no event signals at all — the freeze period matches the socket timeout exactly. Kernel timers are fine (another client thread's 5 s poll ticks precisely throughout).
The in-client crash uploader also fails every time with "Peer certificate cannot be authenticated with given CA certificates", so none of these dumps ever reached you.
Steps for reproducing this issue:
Launch Steam (stable or beta) on this Fedora 44 system and log in (with latest OS updates as of 8 July 2026)
Idle or start a download.
Within minutes: BMainLoop asserts in console, frozen UI, NO CONNECTION cycling roughly every 54 s.
Your system information
Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:
Expected: client stays connected and responsive.
What happens: since ~June 29 the client engine freezes in exact 54-second cycles (84 s on other days). Console repeats steamengine.cpp (2838): Assertion Failed: CSteamEngine::BMainLoop appears to have stalled > 15 seconds without event signalled. The UI goes unresponsive, CM heartbeats are missed, and I get Disconnected By Remote Host / NO CONNECTION loops with downloads at 0 bps. Games themselves launch and run fine.
Not the environment: this survives a full client purge + reinstall, multiple kernel versions, and a Mesa downgrade; during a freeze, curl from the same machine reaches the same CM hosts in milliseconds.
strace during a freeze shows the cause: the IPC:CSteamEngin thread sits in a blocking recv() on a single IPC socket for 33–41 s (until the peer closes it, recv returns 0), and while it's blocked the main loop receives no event signals at all — the freeze period matches the socket timeout exactly. Kernel timers are fine (another client thread's 5 s poll ticks precisely throughout).
The in-client crash uploader also fails every time with "Peer certificate cannot be authenticated with given CA certificates", so none of these dumps ever reached you.
Steps for reproducing this issue:
Logs and dumps attached.
steamdumps07082026.tar.gz