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why does my external hardrive keep asking for me to eject it??

We have a problem with our external hard drive not ejecting on our 2013 iMac. I foolishly turned off the computer without ejecting it and later there were many error messages reminding me to eject before closing down. That has since stopped. When I try to eject it to see if that will reset it, there is no triangle icon to eject it with. I wonder if I have ruined it?

Thanks for any suggestions.


iMac 21.5″, macOS 10.14

Posted on Oct 20, 2022 9:38 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 20, 2022 1:35 PM

Sometimes it needs to be done in Restore Mode...


1. Start up from macOS Recovery

To start up from macOS Recovery, turn on your Mac and immediately press and hold ...


Command (⌘)+R keys


Look for Utilities Menu then Disk Utility.

8 replies

Oct 20, 2022 1:07 PM in response to BDAqua

Hi BDAqua.

Thanks for your response to my question.

I did a screen shut down when I turned off the iMac.

I now recall that I had unplugged the external drive from the back of the computer from its slot, (last week before going away) to check if another device was compatible in that slot, thinking at the time I was unplugging the keyboard.

Then before going away for a few days I thought, better turn off the iMac incase there is one of our frequent power outages. That's when I did a shut down and neglected to eject the drive... realizing it when I got all the messages after starting up the iMac when I returned.

why does my external hardrive keep asking for me to eject it??

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