Ejecting iPods and external drives?

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Why do I need to bother? This takes quite a bit of time (30 seconds goes by slowly when you're in the middle of something hectic), and is unneeded on PCs. Why do Macs require these things get properly ejected? Also, what happens if I don't?
 

chscag

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It's needed on PCs as well as on Macs. Yanking a device loose while the system is writing to it can corrupt the entire file system and sometimes even damage the device. That's why if you're in Windows or OS X, a device has to be properly ejected before removing it.

30 seconds? I don't know how you're counting but ejecting a device only takes around 5 seconds at the most - unless the system is writing to it from a large cache. And then it might take 10 seconds.

Regards.
 
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It's up to you if you want to eject them or not the right way. I learned the hard way a few times, both with PC and Mac, then wehn I just yanked it out, the next time I tried plugging in the drive, it's not readable and I had to reformat it, thus losing that data. 30 seconds seems alike a long time, if you have Snow Leopard, you have an option to force eject it if it's taking awhile anyways.
 
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As stated above, yes, you also need to do it on PCs. If on the iPod you mean you're waiting for the "Ejecting OK To Disconnect" bar to fill all the way up, the fact that it says "OK To Disconnect" means you can disconnect it.

If you've been disconnected your devices that way on any computer, that's hilariously bad for them, and I can't believe you haven't had an issue yet.
 
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I agree that ejecting is the smart thing to do. I've gotten used to it on the Mac now and I don't think I've ever had anything take longer than 3 to 5 seconds to eject. It just makes sense to properly eject a volume before removing it. I mean would you reach into the CD drive with a pair of needle nose pliers and yank out a CD that was spinning?
 
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Ha! Unneeded on PC's? I have always ejected drives from the System Tray in Windows. I would always panic if I accidentally yanked it out without ejecting it.
 

dtravis7


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Windows YELLS at me if I forget to eject the drive. I wonder what version of Windows the OP was using? XP and up for sure warn you.

Also it takes maybe 5 seconds here in OSX to unmount any drive.
 
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In Windows you can set external drives to "Optimize for quick removal" which disables the write-caching, allowing you to remove the device without first ejecting it, with no risk. The caveat is slower performance.
 
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I actually had a co-worker destroy one of my MP3 players by unplugging it from his Windows box without using Safely Remove Hardware; it had to be RMA'd.

The same co-worker later blew up that MP3 player trying to fix it after it was out of warranty. But the story is worth more to me than the MP3 player was ;)
 

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