When I "Safely Remove Hardware" I cannot access it again until reb

  • Thread starter Thread starter jodzeee
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J

jodzeee

My PC has several built-in media card readers. When I download photos from
them, I click on "safely remove hardware" and successfully (i think) remove
them, but then they are no longer recognized if I put another card in the
reader.

If I reboot I can access them again, but I shouldn't have to do that. Does
anyone know why it's doing this or some kind of fix without rebooting every
time so I can access the media cards?

Thank you.
 
You don't need to "Safely remove hardware" to remove the card. When you do
that, you're shutting down the whole card reader, not just the card. Simply
remove the card from the reader and you'll be all set.
 
The way I understand memorycards/readers is that they are like the old
floppy drives. Use a little common sense and dont eject them when the light
is flashing, if the light isnt flashing just pull it out.
 
Thank you, since you put it that way I guess that makes sense. For years I've
been using the "safely remove..." because I thought I was supposed to.
 
jodzeee said:
Thank you, since you put it that way I guess that makes sense. For years
I've
been using the "safely remove..." because I thought I was supposed to.
Click to expand...

Operating systems before Vista may have had caching turned on by default.
This means there could be data still unwritten to the drive. In order to
flush the
cache, you had to use the safely remove option. With Vista, the cache is
off
by default so any data is written to the USB drive immediately and you can
pull
out the USB device as soon as its light goes out (if it has one).

Tom Lake
 
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