Windows XP will not let me eject my usb device

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
G

Guest

I recently purchased a workstation with all the latest updates of Windows XP
Pro. All is working fine except when it comes to safely ejecting a Sandisk
USB flash drive. I click on the safely remove hardware icon, but, receive a
message saying that there was a problem ejecting the drive since it is in
use. However, there is no other application or service accessing it. The
only way to remove the device is to completely shutdown the workstation.
I've checked the USB device on other machinese and it is working fine. I
have not problems accessing the device while it is plugged into the
workstation in question. I have also tried using other USB flash drives on
the said workstation, but, I encounter the same issues. Is there a solution
to this? Or, do I attempt to reinstall Windows XP once again. If anyone has
suggestions, please kindly post. I know this is a small issue, but, it is
annoying.

Thanks in advance
 
Have you tried just pulling the drive out, XP is much more forgiving on this than 2000 was.
 
I'd say this "advice" is less good than it should.
David Vair said:
Have you tried just pulling the drive out, XP is much more forgiving
on this than 2000 was.
Click to expand...

"Just pulling out" is dangerous and you easily could end with losing all
the data & reformatting USB-drive.

More accurate way is to try find who (which process) holds open handles
http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/ProcessExplorer.html
http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/Handle.html
http://www.ints.ru/~aresh/ntpv.zip
Click to expand...

(suppose, USB-drive is locked by yet unknown virus ... huh?)

Also good practice (for me :-) is disabling data caching for USB drives.
HTH
 
Somewhere within the Properties screens for the device is a selection
to be made between "performance" and "safety", or somesuch words. If
you have "Performance", change to the other option. Perhaps somebody
can provide more precise wording, as I'm not on an XP system right now.
 
If you don't see light flashing on your USB stick, then you can pull it out.
Nothing will happen.
if you see light flashing, than wait till it's off.
Also disable write caching for it.
you should select option "optimaize for quick removal" under properties for
usb stick
 
Zibby,

Thanks for the suggestions. How do you disable write caching? I don't see
"optimize for quick removal" in properties. Help please...
 
go to Device Manager (under system)
expand "disk drivers"
right click on USB stick (whatever name it will show up under) and select
properties
then go to Policies and will have 2 options.
 
Found it. Thanks. I guess this just lets me pull the device off without
using the safely remove option. It doesn't, however, resolve the underlying
issue of why XP is refusing to eject the usb device.

Does anyone think if there could be a link with XP's compatability with the
use of SATA drives (like my workstation) and/or the use of motherboards which
support SATA drives only? Just a thought....
 
Well, I went back to the problem workstation and found, unknown to me, a
third party application called Diskeeper Lite running. It looks like it was
loaded along with the Intel application bundle. Nonetheless, after
uninstalling this app, the USB flash drive is working and ejecting normally.

Thanks to everyone for there comments.
 
Back
Top