From: SC Tom on
*** Reply in line

"Twayne" <nobody(a)spamcop.net> wrote in message
news:#QxSQ1z3KHA.5820(a)TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
> In news:A2408E0A-6086-40D2-A76D-3C85F4756316(a)microsoft.com,
> Brian V <BrianV(a)discussions.microsoft.com> typed:
>> Ok It's an external hard-drive. I just re-formatted them.
>> There's nothing on them.
>>
>> It's not for a floppy drive. I thought 3.5" HDD is the
>> right term? (I forgot HDD).
>>
>> I have had that remove hardware icon sitting there for a
>> while now. I just chose remove and it finally went away. In
>> there is said USB Mass Storage. So from now on I will
>> remove those before I unplug them.
>>
>> Jsut curiour though: what info gets written? If I were just
>> dragging and dropping music, video or certain files in
>> programs (extentions with a project or preferences saved,
>> etc), what gets written? In this case is it important to
>> have that information written? Isn't cached data kind of
>> like a log or temporay memory?
>
> Apparently when he saw 3/5" he opted to believe it was a floppy drive, not
> a hard drive. Your information was presented properly.
>
> Yes, you should use the remove hardware icon. The reason is, that a lot
> of things sit in RAM in buffers and don't get written to the hard drive
> when you think they do. You might "Save" a file and think it's over. But,
> the Save results could possible be sittin gin a buffer, not yet written to
> the drive. So if you just turn off the drive, it's going to crash that
> file and it'll probably never be able to be opened again. OR, nothing
> might go wrong. It all depends on what's going on inside the computer.
>
> There is a setting, I forget where at the moment, that lets you tell a
> hard drive to never buffer anything, always write it to disk immediately.
> If you set that, then you'll no longer see your drive in the remove
> hardware window, and you can just turn it off. You do need the gumption
> to be sure you've saved all files that might be in edit ofr that drive of
> course, but ... well that's common sense<g>.

*** That's not entirely true. I have my external drive set for "Quick
Removal (Do not cache. . .)" and that drive still shows in my Remove
Hardware list. I generally use the Remove before unplugging it, even though
everything SHOULD be OK. I figure the extra 5 seconds it takes is cheap
enough insurance to not have a file in the middle of an operation while
unplugging. :-)
--
SC Tom

> Depending on your setup, you may or may not notice that the never-buffer
> setting slows things down a tad because instead of shoving the data into a
> buffer and jumping right to the next task it needs to do, the machine must
> finish that write before it can go on to the next task.
>
> Hope that makes some sort of sense<G>
>
> Twayne`
>
>
From: Twayne on
In news:etVZro03KHA.3580(a)TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl,
SC Tom <sc(a)tom.net> typed:
> *** Reply in line
>
> "Twayne" <nobody(a)spamcop.net> wrote in message
> news:#QxSQ1z3KHA.5820(a)TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
>> In news:A2408E0A-6086-40D2-A76D-3C85F4756316(a)microsoft.com,
>> Brian V <BrianV(a)discussions.microsoft.com> typed:
>>> Ok It's an external hard-drive. I just re-formatted them.
>>> There's nothing on them.
>>>
>>> It's not for a floppy drive. I thought 3.5" HDD is the
>>> right term? (I forgot HDD).
>>>
>>> I have had that remove hardware icon sitting there for a
>>> while now. I just chose remove and it finally went away.
>>> In there is said USB Mass Storage. So from now on I will
>>> remove those before I unplug them.
>>>
>>> Jsut curiour though: what info gets written? If I were
>>> just dragging and dropping music, video or certain files
>>> in programs (extentions with a project or preferences
>>> saved, etc), what gets written? In this case is it
>>> important to have that information written? Isn't cached
>>> data kind of like a log or temporay memory?
>>
>> Apparently when he saw 3/5" he opted to believe it was a
>> floppy drive, not a hard drive. Your information was
>> presented properly. Yes, you should use the remove hardware
>> icon. The reason
>> is, that a lot of things sit in RAM in buffers and don't
>> get written to the hard drive when you think they do. You
>> might "Save" a file and think it's over. But, the Save
>> results could possible be sittin gin a buffer, not yet
>> written to the drive. So if you just turn off the drive,
>> it's going to crash that file and it'll probably never be
>> able to be opened again. OR, nothing might go wrong. It
>> all depends on what's going on inside the computer. There
>> is a setting, I forget where at the moment, that
>> lets you tell a hard drive to never buffer anything,
>> always write it to disk immediately. If you set that, then
>> you'll no longer see your drive in the remove hardware
>> window, and you can just turn it off. You do need the
>> gumption to be sure you've saved all files that might be
>> in edit ofr that drive of course, but ... well that's
>> common sense<g>.
>
> *** That's not entirely true. I have my external drive set
> for "Quick Removal (Do not cache. . .)" and that drive
> still shows in my Remove Hardware list. I generally use the
> Remove before unplugging it, even though everything SHOULD
> be OK. I figure the extra 5 seconds it takes is cheap
> enough insurance to not have a file in the middle of an
> operation while unplugging. :-)

I've come across that myself, now I think about it, some time
ago. No idea why it's that way sometimes.
A comment though; beware trusting the 5 Second rule;
it -should- be, but isn't necessarily, enough time for a large
file or buffer to completely go to disk. It can sometimes take
seconds just for the cpu to get around to servicing the buffer
writes, depending on what it's doing.
Does it allow it to be removed when it appears in the
Remove Hardware List? You could test it by leaving a file
open but saved; that should bring buffers into play.
I've never been sure whether it's Remove Hardware or not
having the write-behind going on that was messed up. Just
curious; not important.

HTH,

Twayne`

>> Depending on your setup, you may or may not notice that
>> the never-buffer setting slows things down a tad because
>> instead of shoving the data into a buffer and jumping
>> right to the next task it needs to do, the machine must
>> finish that write before it can go on to the next task.
>> Hope that makes some sort of sense<G>
>>
>> Twayne`



From: SC Tom on


"Twayne" <nobody(a)spamcop.net> wrote in message
news:#77UgF#3KHA.348(a)TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
> In news:etVZro03KHA.3580(a)TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl,
> SC Tom <sc(a)tom.net> typed:
>> *** Reply in line
>>
>> "Twayne" <nobody(a)spamcop.net> wrote in message
>> news:#QxSQ1z3KHA.5820(a)TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
>>> In news:A2408E0A-6086-40D2-A76D-3C85F4756316(a)microsoft.com,
>>> Brian V <BrianV(a)discussions.microsoft.com> typed:
>>>> Ok It's an external hard-drive. I just re-formatted them.
>>>> There's nothing on them.
>>>>
>>>> It's not for a floppy drive. I thought 3.5" HDD is the
>>>> right term? (I forgot HDD).
>>>>
>>>> I have had that remove hardware icon sitting there for a
>>>> while now. I just chose remove and it finally went away.
>>>> In there is said USB Mass Storage. So from now on I will
>>>> remove those before I unplug them.
>>>>
>>>> Jsut curiour though: what info gets written? If I were
>>>> just dragging and dropping music, video or certain files
>>>> in programs (extentions with a project or preferences
>>>> saved, etc), what gets written? In this case is it
>>>> important to have that information written? Isn't cached
>>>> data kind of like a log or temporay memory?
>>>
>>> Apparently when he saw 3/5" he opted to believe it was a
>>> floppy drive, not a hard drive. Your information was
>>> presented properly. Yes, you should use the remove hardware icon. The
>>> reason
>>> is, that a lot of things sit in RAM in buffers and don't
>>> get written to the hard drive when you think they do. You
>>> might "Save" a file and think it's over. But, the Save
>>> results could possible be sittin gin a buffer, not yet
>>> written to the drive. So if you just turn off the drive,
>>> it's going to crash that file and it'll probably never be
>>> able to be opened again. OR, nothing might go wrong. It
>>> all depends on what's going on inside the computer. There is a setting,
>>> I forget where at the moment, that
>>> lets you tell a hard drive to never buffer anything,
>>> always write it to disk immediately. If you set that, then
>>> you'll no longer see your drive in the remove hardware
>>> window, and you can just turn it off. You do need the
>>> gumption to be sure you've saved all files that might be
>>> in edit ofr that drive of course, but ... well that's
>>> common sense<g>.
>>
>> *** That's not entirely true. I have my external drive set
>> for "Quick Removal (Do not cache. . .)" and that drive
>> still shows in my Remove Hardware list. I generally use the
>> Remove before unplugging it, even though everything SHOULD
>> be OK. I figure the extra 5 seconds it takes is cheap
>> enough insurance to not have a file in the middle of an
>> operation while unplugging. :-)
>
> I've come across that myself, now I think about it, some time ago. No
> idea why it's that way sometimes.
> A comment though; beware trusting the 5 Second rule; it -should- be, but
> isn't necessarily, enough time for a large file or buffer to completely go
> to disk. It can sometimes take seconds just for the cpu to get around to
> servicing the buffer writes, depending on what it's doing.
> Does it allow it to be removed when it appears in the Remove Hardware
> List? You could test it by leaving a file open but saved; that should
> bring buffers into play.
> I've never been sure whether it's Remove Hardware or not having the
> write-behind going on that was messed up. Just curious; not important.
>
> HTH,
>
> Twayne`

For the most part, it will allow me to remove it. I have had a couple of
instances where I ran an installation from the external drive to install a
program on my internal drive and I was not able to disconnect until I
rebooted. Other than that, I've never run into any problem with any files on
either the external or internal drives. I say "5 seconds" since it takes
about that long to click on the icon, pick the drive I want to disconnect,
and wait for the Safe to Remove message. It may be more, it may be less time
than that :-)
--
SC Tom

>
>>> Depending on your setup, you may or may not notice that
>>> the never-buffer setting slows things down a tad because
>>> instead of shoving the data into a buffer and jumping
>>> right to the next task it needs to do, the machine must
>>> finish that write before it can go on to the next task. Hope that makes
>>> some sort of sense<G>
>>>
>>> Twayne`
>
>
>
From: Brian V on
So, I have removed the drives a few times, everytime I turn on my computer.

I choose to format the external drives. I changed their name. I plan to plug
them in and choose remove the drives, but has my decision affected the
possability to remove the cached data permanently? The system keeps
recognizing "safetly remove hardware" upon start-up, but will not go away.
From: SC Tom on

"Brian V" <BrianV(a)discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:E5316368-A155-4F75-92FA-683292A54008(a)microsoft.com...
> So, I have removed the drives a few times, everytime I turn on my
> computer.
>
> I choose to format the external drives. I changed their name. I plan to
> plug
> them in and choose remove the drives, but has my decision affected the
> possability to remove the cached data permanently? The system keeps
> recognizing "safetly remove hardware" upon start-up, but will not go away.

I don't know of any way to get rid of the notification icon. I just live
with it since it's not a problem of any sort. If you are allowed to select
"Safely remove hardware", then the cache (if enabled) is clear. That's not
saying nothing can go wrong, but it's less likely that way.
--
SC Tom