do you "Safely remove hardware"?

[LOUISSSSS]

when u connect your external hdd, USB flash drive, ipod... etc do you always right click "Safely remove hardware" from the taskbar?

yes or no

 

[RebateMonger]

By default, XP disables write caching for USB hard drives, so there's really no need to follow procedure. I've heard of people corrupting USB Flashdrives with "wrongful removal", but I've never had this problem myself.

 

[bacillus]

I voted yes...

 

[theprodigalrebel]

Yes, I always do that routine. However, one or two times, I have accidentally removed my mp3 player without doing that. Nothing happened but the drive wasn't reading/writing anything. The file transfers were over and it was just plugged in.

My brother said his mp3 player once froze when he did that - but he hit the reset button (on the player) and all was normal.

 

[Roguestar]

If it's not writing to the drive at the time, there's no danger. The safely remove hardware wizard can bite me.

 

[CalvinHobbes]

I just yank it out when I'm done.

 

[bruceb]

I always use the Safely Remove Icon .. especially if I need to bring the Flash Drive to use somewhere
else ... If I didn't I might get to the site and find that I can't get to the information ... Better safe than sorry
and it only adds 1 second to do this.

 

[corkyg]

As long as the devices are optimized for quick removal so that write caching is not involved, "Safely Remove" is not necessary. Hot plugging is then a two way street, and it works perfectly.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

Originally posted by: corkyg
As long as the devices are optimized for quick removal so that write caching is not involved, "Safely Remove" is not necessary. Hot plugging is then a two way street, and it works perfectly.

how do i optimize devices for quick removal?

 

[Boyo]

just pull them out and you're fine.

 

[willtriv]

haha not if drive caching is enabled tho

For small volumes window disables write caching, but i have a 4gb drive and in win2k, it didnt disable write caching. I learned the hard way when i pulled it out, left only to find everything intact except the new files i pasted had vanished and there was space taken up on the drive by ghost files. I had to format the thing.

 

[Roguestar]

I had my 30Gb iPod connected to my PC all the time when I was using win2k and I never had that problem nor manually had to disable write caching.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: LOUISSSSS
how do i optimize devices for quick removal?

Easy. In control panel/Hardware/Device Manager, select the device, and then Properties. In the policies tab are two choices - select Optimize for Quick Removal.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

both my USB HDD and USB flash disk is already "optimized for quick removal" so it should be fine if i pulled it out without safely removing from taskbar?

 

[StopSign]

No for flash-based storage.

Yes for hard drives.

 

[trOver]

Originally posted by: StopSign
No for flash-based storage.

Yes for hard drives.

exactly

 

[eplebnista]

No

 

[DLM]

Originally posted by: StopSign
No for flash-based storage.

Yes for hard drives.

yup, me too...




.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: LOUISSSSS
both my USB HDD and USB flash disk is already "optimized for quick removal" so it should be fine if i pulled it out without safely removing from taskbar?

Yes - because write caching is disabled in that case.

 

[PorscheMaD911]

Always.

 

[TanisHalfElven]

Originally posted by: CalvinHobbes
I just yank it out when I'm done.

 

[Jiggz]

Always! Can't go wrong especially for database files.

 

[dennilfloss]

Always. Better safe than sorry. Only takes a couple of seconds and a few clicks of the mouse so why be so impatient?

 

[ForumMaster]

i almost always eject my iPod which does the same thing. sometimes if i put a movie on there, explorer will keep on trying to create a thumbnail which doesn't let me remove it. as long as it's not transferring data, i unplug it. nothing bad has ever happened.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: dennilfloss
Always. Better safe than sorry. Only takes a couple of seconds and a few clicks of the mouse so why be so impatient?

One scenario where you have to eject without "safely removing hardware" is when swapping USB or SATA external backup hard drives on a Windows Server. The person doing the drive swapping doesn't necessarily have the Domain Administrator password that he/she might need to log on and "eject" the drive. There might not even be a monitor or keyboard on the Server.