Disk Not Ejected Properly -- AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AND AGAIN...

Hello Everyone,

Yesterday I posted my experience with the solution that allowed my Lacie 5 TB Rugged drive purchased last September to backup beyond the previous max levels of 37% or 45% before mysteriously shutting off and receiving the unwelcomed "Disk Not Ejected Properly" popup on my desktop.

I hope sending all of you this post doesn't jinx me. Since then, the Lacie drive has been working. Time Machine has made multiple additional backups. And no popups have creeped onto my desktop. As a result, this solution may work for you. Below you will see the screensaver options I selected in system preferences yesterday. Since then, all's well. You might want to try the same.

System: 16" Macbook Pro, Lacie 5 TB Rugged drive used for Time Machine backup only. Mac OS Monterey Version 12.7.1. Hope this is helpful. See images to follow. Wishing you success.

I spoke too soon. Yesterday I had one "disk not ejected properly error" in the morning and this morning I had three. The problem is back and that tells me that it may be a flaw in the Crucial Drive that was temporarily fixed by switching ports, or that it may be something in the Mac or its software. I will be pursuing Crucial's tech support first.

Nice write-up Don, but I wouldn't accept that we have to wait until it is quietly fixed! We all pay thousands of $/euros for our Apple hardware and they owe us more than silence when an obvious OS bug appears in their System Software updates. This bug is so annoying, and like probably all of you, I return to my MacBook Pro M2 after being away for a day to find hundreds of Notification dialogs with this same message.

I used some help to write an Applescript that tries to automate the closure of the hundreds of Notifications, as they take up 20% of my very expensive (but lovely ;-) MacBook Pro screen, and although the script isn't perfect, the script has reduced my time to eradicate the notifications from 5 mins down to 30sec.

We shouldn't have to put up with something that Apple testing has undoubtedly seen...because you don't get 30-40 Mac users saying they have the exact same issue (as in this thread), without there being an issue. No disrespect to Kenneth, but if 30-40 M2 Macbook Pro users have the exact same OS issue, I would lay big money that we don't share the exact same "USB drive cabling errors".

Apple, please fix this, as I'm getting tired of cleaning this screen bug graffiti!

This has been happening to me after purchasing a new MacBook Pro a few months ago, replacing an old MacBook. Upgrade went more or less smoothly, except for couple relatively minor, expected glitches (MacOS on old MacBook was a few versions back).

I had been using a Synology NAS for backups on the old MacBook. Used the same setup for the new machine - the only exception being to switch to a different target directory on the NAS. This worked fine.

The ONLY issue I've had is to keep getting "Disk Not Ejected Properly" after every Time Machine backup - similar to what has been reported here (in particular, this started happening with Ventura (new OS version, but on a new laptop). The backup data on the NAS is OK, and tests show it's usable.

The main difference is I'm using a network connection (SMB). Obviously, my problem is not physical (like a flaky USB connection). Also, I typically do not see cascaded alerts after waking the laptop (e.g. next day) - I see only one alert, although there will have been multiple Time Machine runs since it went to sleep.

I agree this seems to be a MacOS problem, not hardware (nor network). I suspect it's some kind of timing issue in the logic which manages the post-backup disconnect.

It's definitely software. I'm having the same issue. I took my Macmini M2 to the Apple store and recreated the issue in front of the technician, who then tried to run diagnostics and was not able to connect with the Macmini.

He then escalated the matter to Apple's "next level" support. All they did was reinstall the operating system, then run diagnostics. No hardware issues were found. The entire endeavor was a waste of my time. Not to mention the endless hours I spent restoring my system from a Time Machine Backup. Also, neither my magic mouse nor my Logitech mouse was able to connect so I had to run through the set-up using only my keyboard. I called AppleCare to have them provide a workaround. After spending several hours restoring everything, my Macmini is still doing the same thing with the external hard drive plugged directly into the left USB-A port in the back of the Macmini: DISK NOT EJECTED PROPERLY

This is so annoying as it only started happening over the last 2 weeks. This machine has been in use since Oct 2023. I wonder if there is an issue with power delivery to the USB port. I hope Apple addresses this issue soon.

I would say swapping a cable was removing but one of the causes of this annoyance. In my case this happens frequently after a Time Machine backup to our NAS, i.e it’s not a hardware issue. It’s likely an internal timing, mishandled event, or something like that. There’s more than condition in which the system is exposed to the flaw.

I've encountered this frustrating problem for a while, with an 18TB external disk I bought from OWC. Eventually, the disk hardware failed - the heads have a clicking sound when powering up, so there is a component failure. It seems like this issue has a few potential causes. Perhaps some disk health software might be helpful, as a part of the OS (ie: not a third party product) to get a heads-up (no pun intended) on disk issues, as they seem to happen a lot. And FYI, my warranty had just expired and OWC wouldn't help -- the cost to recover data like this is well over 1,000.00 or so.

REJZERRN wrote:

I also have had this same "error message" on my iMac for several months. I've tried plugging my external hard drive into different ports but the same message pops up.

APPLE... PLEASE help us with this.

This is a user-to-user forum. Apple largely is not here, except to moderate it. If you want Apple to hear you, you need to contact Apple Support or drop them a note on their feedback page.

Official Apple Support

Product Feedback - Apple

I too am receiving this error every morning when I wake my Mac mini. One or more of the external hard drives were not ejected properly. I thought the hard drives were aging and maybe being too short out. I bought a new external hard drive which I partitioned. These partitions, which have different names, appear in the finder window. Now here is thing. When waking the computer, only one partition will not have ejected properly. If it were some kind of physical, mechanical problem, then both partitions would have the same issue. No, this is a software issue that Apple needs to address. People pay a preimum for Apple products and for this they expect superior performance. I'm not seeing it here.

I updated to Ventura a while back and am still having the problem with my 2018 MacMini. It's only with one of my external drives, a Crucial X6 1 TB portable SSD, but it's a pain. It also can obscure problems with other drives when a long list of "Disk Not Ejected Properly" alerts makes you overlook a warning about another drive going bad. Agree Apple needs to fix this.

As far as I can tell, the ONLY drive attached to my MacMini 2018 that triggers "disk not ejected properly" errors is my Crucial XC SSDrive. I get anywhere from one to several alerts when I wake the Mac up in the morning, and one or two sometimes when I take a break during the day. Only rarely do I find any problems with the drive. It is partitioned into two drives used for backup of two drives on the Mac, and once or twice they could not be detected for a backup.

This is wacky and frustrating. SOmewhere I saw a suggestion that the problem might be the Crucial X6 SSD was responding too fast or two slow for the Mini.

I have the same very frustrating issue... hey it's a Mac, so it just works, NOT. I get the message even when I eject the disk before I shut down... so fix the OS please. Oh wait, I wonder if it's fixed in Sonoma, not that I am excited or interested to update to yet another version of OSX... is it just more stuff to fix? It really gets old... and I'm not even a software developer. It's the Apple treadmill that never stops, it just means you need a new machine every few years.