removing usb flash drive

[Amanda]

I tend to use a USB flash drive like a floppy disk....copy files to it, take
it out, put it back in......copy files back on to the computer......
My son says I should not take the drive out of the USB slot just by pullling
it out; rather I should first click on the "safely remove hardware" icon in
the tray, & let windows tell me when I can pull it out.
Is this necessary? I had not heard this before, but my son usually knows
more about computers than I.....

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, Amanda.

Run Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc - you'll need Administrator credentials).
In the left column of the Graphical View, right-click on the device, then
click Properties and then the Policies tab. Here you should find radio
buttons to choose between "Optimize for safe removal" and "Optimize for
performance".

Choose safe removal. Then, you can push and pull the USB drive without ever
even seeing the "safely remove hardware" icon.

The actual time that it takes to write the cached data to the device is
usually only a few seconds, anyhow, but the safe removal setting eliminates
even that short delay by skipping the cache and writing all the data
directly to the device. Even then, of course, you'll have to give it time
to finish writing if you've just told Vista to write a multi-GB file to the
USB drive.

While you're in Disk Management, assign a letter (semi-)permanently to that
USB device. Then, it will be "R:" - or whichever letter you choose - each
time you plug it in, rather than becoming whatever is the next letter
available each time.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64 SP1)