'Safely Remove Hardware' - Not Removing and/or Safely ???

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 10 Nov 2007 1:16 pm

I've got 2 WD My Books USB external storage units.

I guess there are 2 ways to shut them off (why have them ON all the time when you aren't putting anything on them).
One way is to simply push the big round green button; ON/OFF.
The other way is the "right" way (I guess), and that is to use the Windows Safely Remove Hardware utility.

Inevitably, almost everytime, I click on that utility and choose to shut down either My Book (K) or (J), up pops "Problem Ejecting USB Mass Storage Device"; the device 'generic volume' cannot be stopped right now. try stopping the device again later.

WELL - this is an annoyance.

Any suggestions, friends?

Chipper

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 10 Nov 2007 2:58 pm

I've always ignored the "safely remove hardware" thing. When I use my external USB connected hard drive, I power it up then plug it in. When I'm done (I use it for Acronis True Image backups)I just unplug it and power it off.

I also do the same thing with the "memory key's" (Thumb drives).

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 10 Nov 2007 6:17 pm

Thanks Jack,

But...what's the difference between pushing the big green "O" ring button, or yanking out the USB cord??

Both turn the unit ON or OFF? Correcto-Mungo???

This is exactly why I love computers.

Chipper

PS - what do you mean by Memory Keys and Thumb Drives? - Would you explain furthur.

Thanks again, Jack.

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 11 Nov 2007 3:54 am

I don't know what the "O ring" button is on your external drive. Is that a power on/off switch? My external hard drive enclosure has it's own AC power supply and a power on/off switch on the rear - the only switch on the enclosure.

I don't think it really matters if you power it off then disconnect or disconnect first then power off. With printers (or all in ones or whatever) connected to PC's, most just power them on or off when they want to use them and there's no regard for the "safely remove hardware" issue for USB connected units.

The "thumb drives" or "memory keys" are the small USB connected solid state memory devices that are now available for PC's. They are similar to the memory cards that cameras use except they have the USB connector and interface. You can copy data on to one of those drives and then take it to another drive and copy the data to that drive, etc.

Dave Potter · Post by **Dave Potter** » 11 Nov 2007 7:14 am

Whether or not it's advisable to use the "Safely Remove Hardware" procedure or not depends on how the drive is configured in the OS.

In the "Properties" for drives, there's a tab called "Policies". In Vista, at least, there are two options to pick from. "Optimize for Quick Removal" disables write-caching, and you can disconnect the drive without using the Safe Removal icon. Clicking the "Optimize for Performance" option enables write-caching for improved disk performance. If this option is selected, it's more important to use the "Safely Remove" procedure, since data could be lost if the drive is disconnected at a time when data is being written to the disk from the cache. It won't happen every time, but the possibility exists.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 11 Nov 2007 1:27 pm

Yes, the green "O" rings are an on/off switch right in front, or rather on the "binding" of the book.

That's the way I had been turning the units on or off.

Then I noticed the 'safely remove icon' in the taskbar and figured maybe I better turn the units off this way.

I never had any problems when using the green "O" rings.

Jim Eller · Post by **Jim Eller** » 11 Nov 2007 5:13 pm

My problem is, the "Safely Remove" thing works but when I plug anything back in it doesn't recognize it.

I have to re-boot.

?????????????

Dave Potter · Post by **Dave Potter** » 13 Nov 2007 4:41 pm

Jim Eller wrote:My problem is, the "Safely Remove" thing works but when I plug anything back in it doesn't recognize it.

Sounds like issues in the registry to me.

Faced with the same problem, I'd have a course of action, but, I really don't care to fight it out here on the forum with those who would disagree with it.

Wiz Feinberg · Post by **Wiz Feinberg** » 13 Nov 2007 5:58 pm

I remember one time when I had to move a thumbdrive between the source computer and two other computers. One of those other computers would not assign a drive letter to the thumbdrive until I relocated the media drive assignments to free up the letter "E." USB devices can be flakey, or not. I also find that sometimes my USB devices fail to come out of standby mode on my laptop.

Dave; If you know of a reg hack for USB devices, I'd like to see it.