Windows 10 ? myPassport BLUE can't remove

WD External Drives My Passport Wireless
1

Hi
Sorry if this is a repeat question but IMO my issuer is specific?
A Blue 3 Tb external WD MyPassport.
P/N WDBYFT0030BBL-0A
31178 (A string of possibly useful numbers)
(NB: O’s or 0’s)
Windows 10 (sux)

I use it for back-up (windows back up - not WD).
The drive is FULL.
I tried to remove the drive with task bar icon (It shows it and 2 USBs)
No reaction. Nothing…
Then checked “This PC”
It is RED as opposed to blue.
Got message that something’s writing to drive and cannot be removed.
Closed all windows, restarted - REALLY long time
Checked “This PC” AGAIN: drive is still there still RED.
Again on re boot got message something is writing to drive.
The drive’s LED is steady blue (as opposed to blinking).
If I shut off the computer, can I remove the drive? Or will that cause more problems?
Safe mode?
Please advise!
Many thanks!

2

I suspect you are posting in the wrong subforum; this is for WIRELESS drives.

BUT - - - in answer to your question;

If the Windows “eject” thing doesn’t work (it doesn’t work for me approximately 50% of the time); you can safely remove the drive after shutting down the machine.

Frankly, removing it WITHOUT shutting down the machine is probably ok as well. . .the issue is write caching with the CPU that may not be complete if you don’t do the “eject” process. Next time you plug in the drive. . . Windows will probably want to run scandsk on the drive. (no big deal)

I suspect the underlying problem in this case is that the drive is full; you probably want to clear off enough to have 10% free space on the drive. I think it is time to buy another drive!!

3

Hi,
Thank you. Wrong sub-folder but thank you for replying!

Everything is okay now.
Tanya

4

I know it’s the wrong forum for this, but often, it’s probably because one process has a file locked on the drive stopping this. Even when I use my iPod Classic, it always locks something even after closing iTunes. Either shutting down or disabling virus scans on the external drive (or disabling some types of defragmenting programs) will help. But I wouldn’t unplug a drive that isn’t ejected. Sure, you probably aren’t using write caching… but if you don’t have the drive formatted as AFS, HFS+J, NTFS, you run the risk of losing files that it can’t recover. Just keep it in mind before doing it.

5

Yes one can unplug a drive not ejecting IF power is off to computer and drive.