How To (Safely) Unpower USB Memory Sticks in Win 10 Laptop?

[GrahamKnott]

I have recently upgraded from Windows 8 to Win 10, and now face an unexpected problem of not being able to unpower any memory sticks from my laptop, despite using the “Safely remove hardware & eject media” option on the taskbar. Is this typical of Win 10?

In the meantime I’ve gone into Hardware and Sound > Power Options in Control Panel and disabled the “Change Advanced Power Settings > USB Settings” And, hey, guess what? Sweet FA.

So I’d appreciate it if someone more knowledgeable than myself can assist in doing what MS developers too often fail to do: resolve an issue that shouldn’t be there in the first place.

Thanks in advance.

[Rustys]

Is there a symbol that looks like ^ on the right side if so then click that and to “Safely remove hardware & eject media” should be there.

[Bastet]

Is ‘Safely Remove Hardware‘ missing when you click the up chevron & then right click on the drive in the notification area or I is it a case that there’s a pop up stating the drive cannot be removed?

[GrahamKnott]

Is ‘Safely Remove Hardware‘ missing when you click the up chevron & then right click on the drive in the notification area or I is it a case that there’s a pop up stating the drive cannot be removed?

Yes, both the / symbol and the “Safely Remove Hardware” instruction are in plain sight when I do the things you’ve indicated. I might add that two of my friends who run Win 10 on their laptops have exactly the same issue, which is why I’ve got such a downer on Microsoft at present.

[Bastet]

So I take it the actual confirmation notification is missing when you click on the drive to safely remove it.
This is caused by focus assist, if this is on then you’ll not receive any notifications.

[Rustys]

When you click the ^ do you see something that looks like

[ATTACH]8044[/ATTACH]

Click on the thumb drive looking thing and then

[ATTACH]8045[/ATTACH]

Select the once you want to remove.

One other think that you can do is open File Explorer right click on the USB drive and click on eject and then wait for the message Safe to Remove.

Also like @Bastet stated check focus assist by going to
Settings
System
Focus Assist

[GrahamKnott]

So I take it the actual confirmation notification is missing when you click on the drive to safely remove it.
This is caused by focus assist, if this is on then you’ll not receive any notifications.

No, the confirmation notification is still present when I click on the drive to safely remove the USB drives (memory sticks in this instance). The message flagged up is: “Safe to remove hardware”, which is explicit enough, I should think. The trouble, of course, is that the light on the drive remains on - a sure sign that the drive is still powered, despite the confirmation message. That’s the problem in a nutshell.

My Win 8.1 Pro “standalone” PC has none of these problems. Even the “USB selective suspend setting” in its Power Options is enabled!

[IMG alt=“Untitled.png”]https://pchelpforum.net/attachments/untitled-png.8044/

Click on the thumb drive looking thing and then

[IMG alt=“Untitled2.png”]https://pchelpforum.net/attachments/untitled2-png.8045/

Yes, I get those on my laptop too - they’re identical, in fact.[/IMG][/QUOTE]

[GrahamKnott]

One other think that you can do is open File Explorer right click on the USB drive and click on eject and then wait for the message Safe to Remove.

Well, I tried that method on my PC, and the weird thing was that it had precisely opposite intended effect on the USB drive: despite selecting eject, the light on the drive stayed on! Likewise I got the same result on the (win 10) laptop. A good suggestion, though. Shame it didn’t come off.

[Bastet]

That is strange.
When I can’t safely remove hardware I usually place the laptop in sleep mode & remove the device.
What’s the brand or USB thumb drive?
Or is the memory stick something else?

[Rustys]

What color are the ports that you are connecting the USB drive to?

The only other thing that I can find is a registry entry that needs to be adjusted and if you are not careful you can cause further issues if done incorrectly.

https://superuser.com/questions/424193/turn-off-drive-after-safely-remove

[GrahamKnott]

That is strange.
When I can’t safely remove hardware I usually place the laptop in sleep mode & remove the device.
What’s the brand or USB thumb drive?
Or is the memory stick something else?

My four memory sticks are Integral, Transcend (2) and a PQ1. Their lights remain illuminated in every case.

What color are the ports that you are connecting the USB drive to?

Two of the three ports on my laptop are black (the same colour as the laptop’s casing). I use one of these ports for my memory sticks.

I’ve had it suggested to me that it’s normal in Windows 10 to have the memory sticks remaining illuminated upon being safely ejected. Is this true?

[Rustys]

I’ve had it suggested to me that it’s normal in Windows 10 to have the memory sticks remaining illuminated upon being safely ejected. Is this true?

Most of my newer USB drive do not have indication lights so when the system states this it is OK to remove and have never had an issue.

[Bastet]

I have SanDisk USB drives with lights & I’m sure the light goes out when I choose eject.

[GrahamKnott]

According to our local PC menders, the lighting status shouldn’t be a problem, so long as one follows the onscreen instructions. Leastways that appears to be the case for Win10. It’s a pity Microsoft doesn’t make it clear, however. I can’t (as yet) find anything in MS’s literature that deals with the issue directly.

[Rustys]

Try using a different user on the system if there is not one then create one and see if is is replicated.

Lets also try a clean boot and see is it does it then.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/how-to-perform-a-clean-boot-in-windows-da2f9573-6eec-00ad-2f8a-a97a1807f3dd

What security software are you running?