G-drive mini shuts down on its own, and complains

As my Time Machine I’ve had a perfectly performing 320GB G-drive mini, USB-connected, for several years. It’s still got a good chunk of space on it. BUT in recent weeks I have been getting desktop messages saying that I failed to shut it down properly–when I haven’t shut it down at all. My iMac is on 24/7, and backups usually occur regularly, even when the g-drive has supposedly been shut down improperly. Sometimes the icon disappears from the desktop; sometimes it doesn’t, despite the messages (which stay on the screen till I close them). To get it to appear if it has actually disappeared, ie, get the mini to function again, I need to use the on-off switch, and it then works again. (I don’t know whether that is a proper shut-down.)

This may be related to interruptions in power or Wi-Fi connection. Does anyone know how sensitive my gadget is to micro-interruptions of some sort? Do I really need to replace my mini? I’ve run Disk First Aid on it, by the way–no real change in these odd shutdowns.

Thanks!

This type of issue is caused usually by the computer going to sleep, the computer trying to put the drive to sleep or aging/failing hardware and the drive losing its connection.

If you have checked your options in Energy Saver and made sure sleep isn’t happening and it isn’t trying to put your drive to sleep and it still occurs, then at this point it is a good idea to get a new drive.