Ejecting / Removing my external hard drive

Richard Sinkler · Post by **Richard Sinkler** » 11 May 2012 12:21 pm

On both my desktop (XP) and laptop (Vista), about 75% of the time that I want to remove/eject my external hard drive, USB thumb drive or SD cards, I get an error that this item can not be stopped because it is currently in use by some program. I close ALL programs and it still continues to give this error. I even disconnect from the network so I am sure a program from the other computer isn't the problem. I finally get so pissed off I just yank the thing out and hope for the best that the info on it doesn't get mucked up.

I feel my luck will run out someday, and I will lose data. What is going on and how can I fix this?

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 11 May 2012 1:04 pm

As long as you know that data isn't being written to or from the drive you're OK to yank. Macs do the same thing sometimes, but you can "force eject" a drive on a Mac. Don't know if you can do that on Windows.

Michael Maddex · Post by **Michael Maddex** » 11 May 2012 1:27 pm

Richard, if you have been viewing the files on the external drive with Windows Explorer or another File Manager, possibly copying files back and forth, and you haven't switched your view to another drive, C: for example, when you are finished, then the external drive continues to be "In Use" because that file manager is looking at the directory listings on the external drive. Force Quit or Force Eject should be a Last Resort. Hope that makes sense and helps.

Richard Sinkler · Post by **Richard Sinkler** » 11 May 2012 3:57 pm

Michael, that may be what is going on. I know when I have Explorer open and was working with the drive, I would have to click another drive to be able to eject it, and even that doesn't work sometimes. But, If I close out Explorer and every other program, is Explorer still running and linked to the external media? My understanding was that closing all programs stopped any connection they would have had to the drive, including Explorer.

Wiz Feinberg · Post by **Wiz Feinberg** » 11 May 2012 4:46 pm

Richard Sinkler wrote:Michael, that may be what is going on. I know when I have Explorer open and was working with the drive, I would have to click another drive to be able to eject it, and even that doesn't work sometimes. But, If I close out Explorer and every other program, is Explorer still running and linked to the external media? My understanding was that closing all programs stopped any connection they would have had to the drive, including Explorer.

Richard;
This may come as a surprise to you and others as well, but, Explorer is also known as Windows Explorer, which launches when Windows loads. As such, it can be customized by each user, so that when they log into their identity on a Windows computer, Explorer.exe displays the layout, wallpaper and icons of their choice (with some limitations).

What I am telling you is that what we know as the Windows Desktop is actually a personalized instance of Windows Explorer.

So, when you view an explorer presentation of a removable drive, you do so in Explorer.exe, which is tied to the Windows Desktop (dressed up Explorer). The fact that you opened an external drive in Explorer remains in memory, even after you close the obvious Windows Explorer folder-details view window.

Sometimes, if you click on a blank space on the Windows Desktop and then press F5, you refresh Explorer's contents and may flush out closed windows.

In case you are unable to eject a removable drive after viewing its contents, you can force the issue by closing and restarting Explorer. To do this, open Task Manager (Ctrl + Alt + Del > Task Manager), find explorer.exe in the list of "processes" and right click on it. The option to End Process will appear after you right click on that process. Do so. The desktop will clear and then reload, icons and all. But, previously viewed drive details will be flushed out.

Try this and let me know if it helps.

Richard Sinkler · Post by **Richard Sinkler** » 11 May 2012 11:12 pm

Great info Wiz. I will definitely try that.

Wiz Feinberg · Post by **Wiz Feinberg** » 12 May 2012 8:52 am

If you use Task Manager to close Explorer and it doesn't restart on its own, go to Start > Run and type: explorer.exe then press Enter.

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 12 May 2012 1:33 pm

Interesting, Wiz. I'll relaunch the Finder the next time that happens on a Mac and see what happens.

Wiz Feinberg · Post by **Wiz Feinberg** » 12 May 2012 3:15 pm

Cal Sharp wrote:Interesting, Wiz. I'll relaunch the Finder the next time that happens on a Mac and see what happens.

I anticipate your report Cal!

Jim Priebe · Post by **Jim Priebe** » 12 May 2012 5:42 pm

If you are old enough to be one who was involved with computers in the eighties/nineties (a life sentence not a privelege

) you would be aware of the term "file cross linking". This was caused by a few different things one of which was incorrect re-writing of files after they were used or modified. The main culprit/s were slow processors, buses etc. These are largely gone now however the risk still remains and operating system designers are acutely aware of this and seem to err on the side of caution hence this will happen especially with USB Hard drives.
Wiz has some good solutions there (there are others but I hesitate to go into them on the forum - sort of "too much detail complex" - but patience and being safe in the knowledge that this is a good process that protects your data is the way to think of it.

Jim Priebe
MCSE

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