7 solutions for when it is impossible to remove external hard drive on Windows

Recently, several colleagues have complained about not being able to remove external hard drives on their Windows computers. There are several reasons for this, including outdated or malfunctioning USB drivers that prevent the drive from being removed or other processes accessing the contents of the drive.

You can choose to unplug the drive without first closing applications that read from it, but doing so can damage your data. You can also use a data recovery to repair and recover damaged files, but there is no guarantee that it will work.

To ensure the safety and integrity of the external hard drive, it is recommended that you remove the drive only after you have closed all processes that use it.

Device removal failed on Windows 10? Try these solutions

If you’ve tried closing applications that accessed files on your external hard drive and still can’t eject the drive, here are some solutions that may help you.

Quick solutions to try to disconnect external hard drive

• Close all programs including your antivirus and try to remove the drive again. How to disable Windows Defender
• If Norton System Works is installed on your PC, it comes with Norton-protected Recycle Bin. This disables the Safely Remove Hardware option so that it doesn’t work when you try to remove the hard drive.
• If you can’t disconnect the external hard drive, try connecting it to another PC and disconnecting it using the Safely Remove Hardware icon. If it works on another system, the problem is likely with the operating system on your computer.
• Disable the Windows Indexing Service. If enabled, you may not be able to remove the external hard drive because the service can cause Windows to constantly access the drive.
• Restart your PC to fix any problems in the operating system that may be affecting the process of ejecting a drive on your PC. When the system restarts, no apps should access the drive, so you can try ejecting it again and see if it works.
• Finally, you could try booting into safe mode and see if you can eject the drive without any problems. If it is possible, it means that a startup program accesses the drive immediately after Windows loads. You will need to try a clean boot to determine which program is the culprit. Windows 10 Safe Mode, Complete Guide

How to fix the device is currently in use

1. Use the Windows Hardware and Device Troubleshooter

The built-in Windows Hardware and Devices Troubleshooter is a tool that helps you detect any problems with your PC or other devices connected to it. You can use this tool to detect a problem that may affect the removal of the external hard drive.

1. Select Start > Settings > Update and security.
2. Then, select Troubleshooting in the left pane.
3. Select Other troubleshooting tools, then select the connected devices.
4. Select Run the troubleshooter and wait for Windows to detect and find any problems before trying to eject the external hard drive again.

2. Use the Run command window to eject the external hard drive

The Run command window allows you to open files, folders or start programs and access web resources in Windows 10. You can also use the tool to run a command and eject the external hard drive.

1. Right-click on Start > Run.
2. Then, enter this command in the Run box: RunDll32.exe shell32.dll, Control_RunDLL hotplug.dll and press Enter.
3. Select the external hard drive in the Safely Remove Hardware dialog box and then press Stop.

3. Use Disk Management to remove the external hard drive

Disk Manager is another tool built into Windows 10 that helps you manage all the drives connected to your PC. If the Windows hardware and device troubleshooting did not help, try using Disk Management and see if it can fix the problem.

1. Select Start, type Disk management in the search box and press Enter.
2. Find your external hard drive in the Disk Management window.
3. Right-click the drive and select Eject. After doing this, the external hard drive will appear as offline, but if you want to use the drive again, you can change its status to online in the Disk Management tool.

4. Close Activities or running processes

If you still can’t eject your external hard drive, use Task Manager to close them all suspicious activities in running on Windows.

1. Open Task Manager by right-clicking on the bar of the applications and selecting Task Manager. Alternatively, you can press the keyboard shortcut CTRL + ALT + CANC and select Task Manager to open it.
2. Select the card Processes to see all running processes.
3. Right-click on any suspicious program or process running on your PC, select End activity to close it and then try to eject the external hard drive again.

5. Update your PC’s USB drivers

Even outdated, outdated, or incorrect USB drivers on your PC can affect your ability to eject the drive from your computer. To fix this, you can update the USB drivers to make sure you have the latest version for your device, then try ejecting the drive again. 6 software to update PC drivers Windows 10, 8, 7

1. Right-click on Start > Device management.
2. Select the list Controller USB (Universal Serial Bus) to expand it, then check for a yellow exclamation point next to one of the entries.
3. If you find an entry with a yellow exclamation mark, right-click the entry and select Update unit software.

If there is no sign next to any of the entries, uninstall the driver and restart your PC. This way, Windows will automatically install the correct and latest version of the USB driver and you can try to eject the drive again.

6. Use Device Manager to eject the external hard drive

Device Manager in Windows 10 is an essential utility that helps you set up or troubleshoot hardware and devices on your computer.

If you can’t eject external hardware drives on Windows using the above methods, you can try ejecting them in Device Manager.

1. Right-click on Start > Control panel and select Hardware and sound.
2. Then, select Device management.
3. Select Disk drive to see all storage devices connected to your computer.
4. Right-click the external hard drive you want to remove and select Uninstall device.

Wait for the process to complete and then unplug the external hard drive.

7. Use a third party utility to eject the hard drive

If nothing else works, you can try a third party utility to help you eject your external hard drive.

One of the free utilities you can use is Process Explorer, an advanced process management utility that provides details about active processes running on your PC. Such details include open or loaded handles and DLL processes on the system so that you can search for them online in case you are unsure of what they are doing.

To use Process Explorer, install and run the tool, then select Find, Trova handle o DLL in the menu. Here you can type the letter drive of your external hard drive and let the tools search for it.

Once you’ve found the drive, right-click on it and select Close handle.

How to safely disconnect an external hard drive from your computer

We hope you were able to find a useful solution from all the methods listed in this guide. If you still can’t eject your external hard drive, consider back up your files its a cloud storage service or find out how to transfer large files from one computer to another to avoid data loss.

If your USB drive is already damaged, check out our guide on how recover data from a damaged USB stick for tips on how to recover your files.