Ok, apparently the correct way to install Steam on Linux is to use the open source Radeon driver installed by default (xserver-xorg-video-radeon), install Steam and all dependencies, then install your proprietary AMD Catalyst driver. If you install the AMD Catalyst driver before installing Steam it will segfault installing. I'll leave this open for now until I get a response.
The crash is in the AMD driver, you should report this to AMD.
Closing as general video driver quality from 2014 is no longer relevant.
Nothing extracted yet.
I installed Linux Mint 16. I tried installing fglrx driver from repos, but it said unsupported hardware. Downloaded and installed AMD Catalyst 14.3 Linux beta driver. Installed steam_latest.deb from steampowered.com. Ran Steam in terminal and segfaulted. Output as follows:
dylan@dylan-PC ~ $ steam
Running Steam on linuxmint 16 64-bit
STEAM_RUNTIME is enabled automatically
Installing breakpad exception handler for appid(steam)/version(0_client)
Uploading dump (out-of-process) [proxy '']
/tmp/dumps/crash_20140318154835_1.dmp
/home/dylan/.local/share/Steam/steam.sh: line 755: 4579 Segmentation fault $STEAM_DEBUGGER "$STEAMROOT/$PLATFORM/$STEAMEXE" "$@"
mv: cannot stat ‘/home/dylan/.steam/registry.vdf’: No such file or directory
Installing bootstrap /home/dylan/.local/share/Steam/bootstrap.tar.xz
Reset complete!
Restarting Steam by request...
Finished uploading minidump (out-of-process): success = yes
response: CrashID=bp-b784486e-c2a9-47d9-8dcf-83a712140318
Running Steam on linuxmint 16 64-bit
STEAM_RUNTIME has been set by the user to: /home/dylan/.local/share/Steam/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime
Installing breakpad exception handler for appid(steam)/version(0_client)
Uploading dump (out-of-process) [proxy '']
/tmp/dumps/crash_20140318154836_1.dmp
/home/dylan/.local/share/Steam/steam.sh: line 755: 4706 Segmentation fault $STEAM_DEBUGGER "$STEAMROOT/$PLATFORM/$STEAMEXE" "$@"
Finished uploading minidump (out-of-process): success = yes
response: CrashID=bp-51b96ba2-6e41-4d53-860d-82d8a2140318
dylan@dylan-PC ~ $