I'd like to know when the problem started happening for you. I actually have GamerOverlayRenderer.dll disabled in winecfg because it was preventing me from playing half-life after the update on August 19, 2010. As for the overlay itself running as a program, I'm a little confused. The overlay is just a part of Steam, correct? Having never used the steam overlay myself, I'm curious as to what it is, actually. Since I disabled GamerOverlayRenderer.dll in winecfg (libraries tab), I've been playing all of my steam games with no problem, and when I'm not playing, the Steam icon is present in my panel and also works without any problems. I can chat with friends through steam chat and even purchase games, etc through the internal browser.
