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Computers

'Safely Remove Hardware' oddity

Running desktop PC with XP Home.

The 'Safely Remove Hardware' feature works fine, but I'm puzzled as to why, when I click on the icon, the HDD 'C' is always in the list. I've seen several friends' XP machines, and it doesn't happen on theirs. Is there any way to correct this, and would anything awful happen if I clicked on 'C' drive by mistake?


4candles  Sat 05/07/08 00:09
ChuckFickens
Sat 05/07/08
09:25
Excellent Rating
is it a SATA hard drive (or SATAII specifically if I remember correctly)

if it is then they are hot pluggable so in theory you could remove it "on the fly" which is why it's showing in the safely remove hardware.

wouldn't recommend doing it on your system drive though, at the very least it's going to "hang" your current windows session and you are going to lose any unsaved work you have open.
rojash
Sat 05/07/08
11:56
Yeah, it would be really nice if MS had thought to incorporate a setting "never ask if I want to remove this device".
4candles
Sat 05/07/08
12:23

Question Author

Thanks Chuck, yeah, I can see what you mean.

Seems a bit odd though. Obviously I'm very careful to avoid clicking on C: drive, but I'd be a bit nervous if it was SWMBO's hand on the mouse, the way she tends to have the pointer wandering 'somewhere in the vicinity' before clicking.

Yes, it is a SATAII - the pointer message says:

Safely Remove SATA MAXTOR STM SCSI Disk Device - Drive (C:)

Just to confirm, then, this is normal on this type of installation?

On reflection - maybe nothing bad would happen anyway, as the C: drive is always in use, and Windows would tell me that 'the device cannot be stopped right now' ?
rojash
Sat 05/07/08
17:10
Excellent Rating
Being the reckless person I am, I just tried it for you, 4candles, and you're right - Windows tells you that it can't be stopped right now.

And yes, it's normal for SATA drives
4candles
Sat 05/07/08
17:29

Question Author

Thanks for that, rojash - you're a braver man than I ;>)
ChuckFickens
Sun 06/07/08
13:55
Excellent Rating
following a little more research into this it would seem that it is mainly a issue that appears on either Nvidia or VIA chipset based motherboards when the advanced SATA controller drivers have been installed.

I have found two "workaround's" for it, but one also disables write caching on the drive, which would have some serious performance side effects and the other is a registry hack, which for such a relatively minor issue it probably isn't worth the risk of playing with the registry.

if you have either a Nvidia or VIA chipset based motherboard keep an eye out for the updated drivers for it, they are likely to fix this quirk in a future release.
4candles
Sun 06/07/08
14:18

Question Author

Aye, it's Nvidia.

I'll watch out for updated drivers.

Many thanks, Chuck & roj, a virtual medal for both

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