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

My 2012 MacBook Pro suddenly decided that (upon plugging my backup drive in) that it hadn't been ejected properly. The icon for the Time Macine Hdd would appear, then disappear with the message that the drive hadn't been ejected properly... and around in circles thing went until I just unplugged the drive and went to see if Google had any information.

I found a link that had some ideas listed, and apparently SOMETHING worked because I can now plug the drive in, do a Time Machine back up, eject it and go on with my life.

This involved opening up the Terminal and typing in some commands, getting rid of some local Time Machine files, and then plugging in the drive and removing a file from there (I believe its extension was *.inprogress).

Anyway, for me, this worked. I have no idea if this is related to the issue that the newer machines are experiencing or not. It was items 6 and 7 in this list that worked for me. Here's the link:

https://macpaw.com/how-to/time-machine-backup-failed

I've encountered this recently on three different Mac Minis (OSX 13.6.5) using three different drives (8T SSD) connected with three different cables to (USBC-to-SATA). I've tried all the things: re-install the system, reset SMC, reset NVRAM, etc. Maddening! However, yesterday it occurred to me that I'd never noticed it happening when the WiFi was turned off. So I tried an experiment by letting the computer run overnight with the WiFi off and returned to the shop in the morning to find no "Disk Not Ejected Properly..." messages. The moment I turned on the WiFi they started appearing again, in rapid succession. When I turned off the WiFi they stopped.

When I opened System Settings>Network>Wi-Fi, I saw that the error messages coincided exactly with a spinning gear appearing next to "Other Networks" — every single time. If I forget the known network, it seems the issue is even worse. WiFi off, the behavior stops. Thoughts?

It is incredible to me that this problem has persisted as long as it has without a fix from Apple. This is one of several serious problems I've noticed with the MacOS. It is pretty evident that Apple does not have its "A" team working on the Mac, since the Mac represents a tiny fraction of their revenues. iOS, on the other hand, seems quite solid.

I do my computing with FreeBSD and Linux. But my wife needs to use an easily replaced system (I'm her IT department and am 81 years old, so may not be available to set up a new system for her) that can do encryption, so the choices are the Mac and Windows. Much as I dislike Windows, it was clearly the better choice, because in our experience, Windows exhibits far fewer problems. We've given up on the Mac.

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.

Yes, this has happened with my hard drive. Maybe the cord’s components are fried. It happens sometimes. I remember my Mac kept doing this with my iPod from 2005. Also do you have the latest Mac OS?

Replacing connectors or changing ports may work, but when I switched ports the problem returned in a couple of weeks. So far turning off sleep options seems to work better.

This post saved my sanity. Thanks so much!

Thanks for the suggestion!

I bought the Amphetamine app for just this purpose and I still get the "Disk" nonsense. Luckily, I only get two notifications when I wake the computer every morning.

Disc not ejected properly from my Apple notebook Pro.