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I've tried to eject an external drive but it just won't be ejected. I know it is safe to pull out the external drive when the machine is shutdown but this is a fileserver and I can't shut it down just like that. Is it safe to plug out the external usb harddisk when logoff?

Please note that before this I can successfully eject the disk every single time. But not today. And there's no application running on it & I've waited for half an hour after clicking the eject button.

Machine: Dell R200, Windows Server 2003

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  • what does it display during this half hour?
    – Tommy
    Commented Nov 30, 2010 at 3:30
  • It displays nothing.
    – hsym
    Commented Nov 30, 2010 at 5:41

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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If the external disk isn't spinning (reading/writing), you can probably disconnect it without damage. Sounds like your file server needs a reboot, though. I've observed the same behavior on other machines, and often a reboot will fix it.

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  • Yesterday I plugged in 2 external harddisk. This morning I successfully ejected one harddisk, but the other one just won't eject.
    – hsym
    Commented Nov 30, 2010 at 5:44
  • Update: After waiting for everyone to go home, I tried to eject it again before I try to shutdown the server and poof, it works. Huh.
    – hsym
    Commented Dec 1, 2010 at 4:03
-1

See:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/236841-31-safely-remove-hardware

http://www.onlinecomputertips.com/hardware/hq71.html

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