Can't connect to Steam

[Arbor plena simia]

Hi, I'm aware of a simmilar topic, but tried the suggested deleting ClientRegistryblob and restarting Steam etc. to no avail.
Basically I can go online on Steam, and see my profile, games, store, it updates everything fine etc. But at the bottom it says "No connection", and I can't see my friendslist with it saying "No network connection could be made to the Steam servers. Steam will automatically retry conection untill the service becomes available."
This means that while I can play all my games, I can't access my items in TF2, but can see my achievments Usually when I lose connection to the server I lose all items, all achievements and access to my profile.
What's worse is that I can't install any new games; I have Brink taunting me

I've had this problem for the last 30 days; that's when it says I was last online, despite being logged onto Steam everyday. But it hasn't been an issue due to exams, but now I've finished.
This timescale does coincide with coming back to university, but I have had absolutely fantastic connection to Steam in the past. And in my first year when they wouldn't let it through, I couldn't get Steam online at all. This time it just says no connection.
I should note that I haven't been able to access achievements in Audiosurf or Portal since about the Potato Sack update, before coming back to university, but TF2 was fine.

As said above, I have deleted ClientRegistryBlob. But on restarting Steam the first time I got an error saying "delete of Steam.exe failed, Win32 Error 5 "Access is denied"." So I click ok then load Steam agin, and it updates, logs on fine. But still says "No connection" etc. Bah

Sorry if this is a little long. Any help would be appreciated

[Deathtaker27]

have you contacted steam support and informed them?

[Arbor plena simia]

Yeah, only thought of that just after I made this topic! D'oh.
Contacted them last night. here's hoping for a quick reply

[coldandtired]

This can sometimes happen if there are two instances of Steam.exe running (because one instance didn't exit properly, for example). Check Task Manager to see (or just restart the PC).

[Arbor plena simia]

This can sometimes happen if there are two instances of Steam.exe running (because one instance didn't exit properly, for example). Check Task Manager to see (or just restart the PC).

Only one Steam.exe running it seems. And I've had this problem for several weeks, so done plenty of restarts

[Arbor plena simia]

Well, just had a quick attempt on TF2 see what was what. Now I can't join any server or do training etc, saying Steam validation incorrect. And I can't even load some other games with a popup saying failed to connect to key server...
Steam Support had better get back to me soon

[Deathtaker27]

have you tried, starting it manually, full removal of all steam folders and re-install? picking a different location server? running it on a different account? (ideas off the top of my head)

[Arbor plena simia]

I've realised it's probably a university network thing.
I got my father to sign into my account from home and it works fine. So it's either my computer or the network I'm on.
I've opened all required ports on my computer to no avail, so I imagine its a university problem. I'm seeing them tomorrow to hopefully suss it.

I will try some of what you suggested though, thanks

[Arbor plena simia]

It seems that Steam moved some server addresses. The university's replacing its firewalls so it should be fixed once that's done. Hopefully it'll be back up soon.

Thanks for the help though folks