Quick question about ejecting USB devices

[Mark Kaine]

So my Windows somehow stopped giving me the message when I click to remove a USB stick or similar "the device can now be removed safely"

 

 

And I want it back, because from experience it won't be long until it breaks some of my USB devices. 

 

 

And yes I'm aware that you supposedly don't need to do this anymore because of some automatic windows settings, my about 5 or so dead USB sticks say otherwise though. 

 

So how do I turn this message back on?

 

 

[mariushm]

That message has nothing to do with damaging usb sticks or not.

Your usb stick will be just as easily damaged as before.

 

What's going on.... Windows used to cache writing to sticks, so it reported that a file was copied successfully to usb stick before the file transfer actually finished - after the copy window closed, windows would continue to write to the usb stick for a few seconds in the background.

Also, if the files were very small, Windows would almost instantly say file was written, but in reality it was kept in ram for a bit - think opening a Word document from stick and clicking Save ...

 

So the message "it's now safe to remove the stick" simply says that all the pending writing operations have finished, so now you can remove the usb stick without corrupting files or incomplete files, and you know for sure a document was saved or not.

It does nothing for removing power from the actual usb connector or whatever.

 

In the new Windows versions, Windows simply doesn't cache files anymore, so it has no reason to say those messages anymore because there's no more risk of incomplete or corrupted files.

 

Anyway... you can actually revert to "caching writes" and that annoying message :

From : Microsoft Ditches ‘Safely Remove USB’ Requirement — Just Pull It Out | Tech Times

Quote

Microsoft Ends Safely Remove USB

Until now, the default policy in Windows 10 and all previous versions of the operating system when inserting a USB device was "Better Performance." With Windows 10 v1809, however, Microsoft decided to make "Quick Removal" the default instead.

 

What's the difference between the two?

Well, Better Performance facilitates fast data transfers and storage operations. This includes caching data while it's being transferred opened, or in preparation for other commands. However, this requires the user to hit "Safely Remove Hardware" before pulling their storage device out to avoid risks of data loss or hardware damage. All users on Windows probably know this.

With Quick Removal, meanwhile, Windows 10 puts storage devices in a state where they can be disconnected without following the Safely Remove Hardware protocol. There are downsides to this, of course, chief of which is speed. Since in this setting Windows won't cache disk writes, the data move to an external device might take longer to transfer.

How To Switch To Better Performance

Luckily, Microsoft will allow users to switch to their preferred setting on a per-device basis. Simply connect the external device to the computer, right-click Start, then hit File Explorer. Find the letter or label associated with the device. Then right-click start again, and select Disk Management. There, find the label of the device, right-click, and hit "Properties." Go to the "Policies" and select either Better Performance or Quick Removal.

 

[Mark Kaine]

18 minutes ago, mariushm said:

In the new Windows versions, Windows simply doesn't cache files anymore, so it has no reason to say those messages anymore because there's no more risk of incomplete or corrupted files.

 

36 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

my about 5 or so dead USB sticks say otherwise though. 

 

 

In any case.  I need to know how to display that message again. I know it's hidden somewhere lol. 

 

I mean it shows me the device and I can click on "eject this device"  but it won't display the message about that the device can now actually be removed safely. Doesn't need a genius to see that something is wrong with that. 

 

I suppose it's somewhere in that forsaken "message from other senders "  settings,  but I haven't found it yet. 

 

 

PS: just to be clear,  that proposed solution is not what I was asking for,  I have like 15 or so USB storage devices so this is A) very very tedious and B) it's greyed out anyway so I can't change it even if I wanted (which I do not) 

 

"this device can now be removed safely" 

 

Message is what I was asking for. 

 

 

[mariushm]

I just told you how to get it back, read the text I quoted.

You may have to do it for each usb stick. Like I said, it's placebo if you think it will keep your sticks safer.

 

I repeat It doesn't say you can safely eject your device anymore because Windows is no longer caching files, everything is written right away, so there's no longer a risk of data loss. That's all that message is about ... data integrity, nothing electrical or physical safety related.

 

But I guess just like you didn't read my explanation you won't read this also.

[Mark Kaine]

Unfortunately you didn't read the question. 

 

I mean it's ok not to know an answer to a question but then why reply with a "solution" that doesn't work for the described problem? 

 

 

[mariushm]

53 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

So how do I turn this message back on?

 

 

20 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

In any case.  I need to know how to display that message again. I know it's hidden somewhere lol. 

 

I mean it shows me the device and I can click on "eject this device"  but it won't display the message about that the device can now actually be removed safely. Doesn't need a genius to see that something is wrong with that. 

 

I suppose it's somewhere in that forsaken "message from other senders "  settings,  but I haven't found it yet. 

 

Are you thick ?

 

 

If you select Better Performance, you'll have to right click and select Eject or Safely Remove or whatever, and you'll get that message "it is now safe"...

 

[Mark Kaine]

18 minutes ago, mariushm said:

 

 

Are you thick ?

 

 

If you select Better Performance, you'll have to right click and select Eject or Safely Remove or whatever, and you'll get that message "it is now safe"...

 

That's what I'm saying all the time you aren't listening. 

I get this 

 

 

But I do *not* get a message "it is safe now" 

 

Thus = my files are obviously in danger of getting corrupted,  that's how it always was on Windows and I don't see how that would have suddenly changed. 

 

 

You're acting like every new change the Windows update team makes doesn't come with a plethora of issues and bugs... 

 

Like they don't get even a single feature done that "just works". 

 

You also somehow missed where I said the option to change between old (the one that works) way and new way (which does not work) is greyed out,  it cannot be changed. 

 

23 minutes ago, mariushm said:

Are you thick ?

Yeah, I wonder. 

Please stop replying to my topic, I need a solution for this problem preferably outside of "reinstall windows".  I'm not gonna reinstall windows every time the Windows update team has an "idea"... 

 

So if anyone knows where the setting for the 

 

Quote

This device can now be removed safely 

Spoiler

 

message is that would be great! Especially for the data on my USB devices.  Thank you. 

 

 

[Mark Kaine]

Update: it's a bit embarrassing but also not really my fault... Actually a Windows update turned off "receive messages from other senders"... I should have checked this but I was absolutely 100% certain I had this turned on - and I don't expect an Update to continously reset my settings, even though that seems to be normal Windows 10 behavior. 

 

 

 

 

And for the record: only now it ejects / unmounts my USB drives correctly,  before my external hard-drive would always make a high pitched, screeching sound when I unplugged it,  even after clicking "remove this device safely"  which as I already tried to explain does absolutely nothing by itself and is very dangerous for the data on the drive,  it still needs the "device can now be removed safely" message to actually work. 

 

Welcome to Windows and hopefully this helps someone with  similar issues.