Problem Ejecting External Disk - This device is currently in use

Question

Hello,

After I connect my external disk to my HP Z4 G4 business desktop, I cannot safely remove / eject it anymore. Windows 11 says "Problem Ejecting USB Attached SCSI - This device is currently in use." Also after I click the safely remove button 100 times. It happens even right after I start my PC without doing anything else. The only way to properly disconnect the external disk seems to be to shut down the PC.

When I connect the external disk on another PC that runs Windows 10, I don't have the issue. Both PC's have Norton installed, so that doesn't seem to be the cause.

Is there a way to find out which process is preventing me from safely removing the disk?

Thanks in advance!

SJW

PS My external disk is a Sandisk Professional G-Drive 12 TB.

Answer 1

Hi,

My name is Igor, it's a pleasure for me to help others and I'll do all my best to help you.

Please use Handle tool to see what program uses the disk. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/...

Answer 2

Hi Igor,

Thanks!

I had a look at Handle and also at the mentioned GUI version. However, to my insight the tool displays more or less the same information as Windows Task Manager (processes / services, performance, etc.). It doesn't tell me which processes or services could be the cause for not being able to eject my external USB disk.

Maybe I should have a closer look though. Thanks again!

Kind regards,

SJW

Answer 3

Please run command prompt, run

handle E:

command and show the result. Replace E with a correct disk letter if needed.

Answer 4

Hi Igor,

Thanks again. I wasn't able to run Handle from the CMD prompt. When I clicked the .exe a CMD screen came by but I couldn't read the lines that quickly.

Therefore I used the search feature of Process Explorer with my [disk] in the search field. I presumed it does the same because it includes Handle.

Results:

• When Explorer is running, it finds two hits;
• After closing Explorer, it finds zero hits, so I guess no handles on my disk (?);
• However, when I try to safely remove the USB disk, Windows 11 still won't allow me ("This device is currently in use").

I believe it's a bug in Windows 11 around 'cache writing policy'. In Windows 10 I don't have the issue with the same external disk.

Thanks for your help!

SJW

Answer 5

Hi,

Within the Event Viewer I found out it's process id 4 (SYSTEM) that stops the safe removal / ejection of my G-DRIVE.

The application System with process id 4 stopped the removal or ejection for the device USB[etc etc]

Process command line:

List of affected devices:

STORAGE\Volume[etc etc]

In the above text I replaced the identifiers of the disk with [etc etc] because I don't want to share personal id's here.

For now I will stop searching for a solution and believe it's a bug in Windows 11 around cache flushing or a compatibility issue between Windows 11 and my Sandisk Professional G-DRIVE.

Work around: every time I want to remove the G-DRIVE external disk, I will have to shut down my PC completely before removing it.

Thanks for all your replies and suggestions.

SJW