I would post this in the Counter Strike section, but this applies to steam and all games that operate with it.

So this morning when I started my computer steam tried to start itself as usual. But instead of starting it came up with this message.

"Running Steam in Windows compatibility mode is not recommended. Please remove any Windows compatibility settings for all users under file properties for Steam.exe and restart Steam. Press 'Cancel' to premanently ignore this warning and continue."

This is the second time it's happened to me. I never set steam to run in compatibility mode. It just did it by itself. I hit cancel to ignore it "permanently" the last time it happened(a couple weeks ago.) But apparently it's not permanent. It also stops you from playing. So I figured just in case it happens to anyone else, I would post the way to fix it.

This fix works in Windows 7 and Vista. In windows 7 just open the start bar and type "regedit" into the "search programs and files" bar at the bottom.


To fix the issue:

1. Hit start->run->regedit
2. Go to key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers
3. Look for a entry with your path to steam.exe(Hold your mouse over each entry until you see steam in the title.)
4. Delete that entry
5. If you dont find it there try HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers


Hope this helps if you get the issue.

EDIT: Re-Installing steam won't fix the issue.