I did look online for this answer before coming here, so yes I tried.

The directions that came with the 160GB My Passport Essential external hard drive sucked. I assumed you have to eject it, but when I try to eject it there isn't really anything there for me to eject like when I use my iPod. Then a message comes saying it can't be ejected.

Someone mentioned dragging the icon to the trash??

Does it even need to be ejected? SHould I remove the USB cord before I shut off my computer?

I received a message saying the data had errors and didn't save to my drive F because I unhooked the cord, so I have to be doing something wrong.

THanks.

I have never used an iPod but I do use Passport drives which I like a lot!

There basically are no directions beyond plug and play.

If there is a Safe Remove Hardware icon then that should work.

The basic idea of that is to ensure that the drive is not active. If disconnected while active it would lose its data. If there is no activity between the computer and the drive then simply removing the cable whether the computer is on or off should not affect the drive.

When you say you try to eject and you get an error can you please describe that in more detail?

Are you using the Safely Remove Hardware feature on the Task Bar? Or ... ???

Also can you elaborate on the message saying the data had errors etc. ?

Where is that coming from and what are you doing that provokes it?

I haven't used it in a few weeks, so I thought maybe the problem would go away... but no. There is no "eject" option to use like normal things you plug into USB ports, so I have just been unplugging it from the port. Today, again, I received this message... (assuming you can post pics here??? I don't know)



Anyway, it says " windows was unable to save all the data for the file \Device\HarddiskVolume3. The date has been lost. This error may be caused by a failure of your computer hardware of network connection. Please try to save this file elsewhere.

It's confusing, because I didn't save anything new to the external hard drive. I merely looked at the pics on the drive. I am pretty confused, so I appreciate any help.

Try turning off the write caching on the disk as seen here:

You receive an error message when you save or move documents in Windows XP: "Delayed Write Failed"

Also seen here with WD ex drives:

Windows - Delayed Write Failed - Solved! | Gibni.com - Advanced Technologies in making money, web development, mobile, fun, entertainment...

Awesome. Thanks! I never knew about the options to change the settings for saving files.

Cool! Glad it helped. Those little drives are really neat!