Disk not ejected properly

Henry,

I adjusted the settings as you suggested (in Mavericks) and for three days had no "disk not ejected properly" messages.Then I updated the OS with Yosemite Public Beta 3 and all the additional updates, reset the Energy Saver preferences, and so far today have had two such occurrences of the "not ejected properly" error message. I don't know how to explain it.

Ken

"Solved by going to Finder, locate disk under "devices"; next to the name of the device is the Eject symbol as on the keyboard. Just click the symbol."

That begs the question, doesn't it? It simply ejects the disk, and while that solves the "not ejected properly" problem, it means you still have to plug the external drive back in.

Am I missing something here?

OK, I'll offer my solution to what turned out to be a really simple problem. I've been fighting this issue for the better part of a year, since I bought my Macbook Pro. I've tried Jettison, resetting all sorts of things, everything I've been able to find online and found no solution that worked consistently. I have three external drives, all different brands: WD, Seagate, and ioSafe.

Turns out (drumroll please) I have an APC UPS that has "smart" outlets. When the "master" plug goes dark (in my case a Thunderbolt display when it sleeps), the other outlets shut down, including the ones into which my drives are plugged. This type of power strip is becoming more and more common. I plugged these into a "regular" outlet and problem solved.

I doubt this will help everyone, but it's a simple (and stupid to overlook) solution that helped me.

My contributions to the discussion :

Configs:

1. 2013 New Mac Pro - base model quad etc.... no modifications

2. 2012 Macbook Pro Retina 17" - quad, SSD internal, etc...

3. 2012 Mac Pro - 6 core 3.33 internal pci SSD + Sata drives, etc...

4. 2010 Mac Pro - 12 core 2.8 - SSD + Sata internal drives...

External drives:

A. Thunderbolt - G|Drive Pro Thunderbolt 4TB

B. USB 3 - Lacie Rugged 500GB

C. USB 3 - Seagate Expansion 1TB

D. USB 3 + eSata - Comkia (generic) enclosure w/ 500GB Samsung SSD

E. USB 2 + eSata - Vantec Nexstar dock (currently contains a 3TB Seagate 7200rpm Sata drive

... Plus others

OS

All computers are currently running 10.9.2

Successes

#3 and #4 computers above do not exhibit any problems with drives improperly disconnecting. Both computers are either always on or manually powered down. Sleep is not allowed and hard drives are never turned off for energy purposes. Drives B thru E work with no issues (Drive A is Thunderbolt and there is no Thunderbolt port on the old Mac Pros).

Failures

#1 - the new Mac Pro is how this problem was discovered. Purchased August 25, I was told by Apple Care that the problem was the logic board. I returned and exchanged the computer on September 25th at a retail store. Their Genius Bar "confirmed" that it was a logic board problem. Within minutes of setting up the new computer, the "disk improperly ejected" message appeared. I was about to RMA the drive when I decided to try every drive/computer/connection combination to find a pattern.

Here's the track record so far:

1 + A : DNEP when waking. DNEP also during use, at random times.

1 + B : DNEP during use

1 + C : DNEP during waking and during use

1 + D : DNEP during waking

1 + E : Working fine for 4 days. No problems

#2 - 2012 Macbook Pro Retina - I decided to plug the Thunderbolt drive into this computer just to troubleshoot and lo' and behold, the DNEP error message displayed after waking the computer. I was starting to think it was just the drive itself causing the problem, but in the same moment, two USB3 drives failed on the nMac Pro, ruling out the possibility that the problem was computer or hard drive hardware related.

2 + A : DNEP during waking

2 + B : Works fine, only DNEP message was when plugged into a cheap USB3 hub

2 + C : Works fine

2 + D : Works fine

2 + E : Never tested

Next Steps

Just got off the phone with Apple Care tier 1. He's flabbergasted as to why the problem would persist on a separate computer, as his initial thought was the drive was the culprit. He had me update to 10.9.5, and reset the P-RAM. He wants me to call tier 2 if the problem persists. He did not mention anything about cables, power supplies, or energy saving.. but he did spend a lot of time discussing how ports could be bad on the computer.

Based on the messages in this forum I am convinced the problem cannot be a cable problem. How likely is it that all of us would have a bad cable? My cables are new because all of my equipment is new. I am with those who think it's a software problem. Specifically, how the software interprets information coming from the hardware. Neither of my older Mac Pro's have issues connecting to and disconnecting from drives, and none of my drives exhibited issues with improperly disconnecting until the purchase of the new Mac Pro. The same software is installed on all systems but maybe something in the software is interpreting the drive information differently based on the hardware configuration of the computer.

I'll keep you posted with the status of the 10.9.5 update + P-RAM reset

I don't want to detract in any way from the thorough and elegant exposition by mrrosskeys of what has turned out to be a nearly impossible-to-solve problem.

I can only add the following:

With my single computer, a mid-2012 15" Macbook Pro Retina, and two external drives, a G-Drive Thunderbolt which never has a DNEP, and a WD MyBook USB 3.0 which has DNEPs every day under any and all circumstances, and having tried all the various remedies suggested in this long thread, along with calls to Applecare, the cause remains elusive. Not only that, but I've been on the Yosemite Public beta, latest version, for a month, and it's still there, which doesn't offer much hope that it's an OS issue.

I do wonder whether it is the WD drive, because it has been known to shut itself off for no apparent reason, but on the other hand, I'm not sure it's ever happen while I was actively using the computer, and it almost always restarts itself.

All that said, in response to bfhaith's earlier post about the smart power supply, I just checked and my WD drive is plugged into a UPS, but it's not a "smart" UPS and not connected to the computer via USB, so unless it's powering off intermittently, I don't think that's the answer. In any case, I've moved the WD to a regular 120V outlet and will see if that changes anything.

Just to update everyone, I am no longer getting this message and can sync my iPod again. But it took completely replacing both USB ports to accomplish this. The logic board was also replaced, although I was not experiencing any problems with the logic board. It cost $1450 because they kept saying there was liquid damage no matter how many times I explained that unless poltergeists are doing it, there have been no spills on my laptop. Whatever they have inside that indicates liquid damage is inaccurate. But apparently Apple is never wrong and users are always the problem.

After 24 hours, I have had a total of zero DNEP messages on the New Mac Pro and Macbook Pro.

I did a bunch of things all at once, so I cannot attribute one step to fixing the problem. Here are some of the things I did to the New Mac Pro:

- Reset P-RAM

- "Put hard disks to sleep when possible" is turned off

- "Wake for network access" is turned on

- "Prevent computer from sleeping automatically when the display is off" is turned on

- "Enable power nap" is turned off

- Updated to 10.9.5

- Ran "Caffeinate" from Terminal (this was before I updated to 10.9.5 but I doubt it's running now because I haven't re-opened Terminal)

Here's what I did to the Macbook Pro:

- "Put hard disks to sleep when possible" is turned off

- "Wake for network access" is turned on

- "Prevent computer from sleeping automatically when the display is off" is turned on

- "Enable power nap" is turned off

The Macbook Pro hasn't been updated past 10.9.2, and I did not reset the P-RAM. It's hard to think that the entire problem was fixed on both computers by not allowing the hard disks to sleep... but so far it seems to be the only consistent thing between computers.

All of the other computers we use here had a computer sleep setting of never and quite possible that was why the other computers never had a problem with Mavericks causing disks not to be ejected properly.

Once again, I will update if anything changes.

First, after removing the power supply for my WD drive from the UPS and using a regular power strip, I am still getting the DNEP messages, so it wasn't the UPS that was doing it.

Second, on my MacBook Pro Retina, I have the settings exactly as does mrrosskeys, although I don't have the - "Prevent computer from sleeping automatically when the display is off" is turned on" option in Preferences/Energy saver under either Battery or Power Adapter. I have a MBP Retina mid-2012 and am now running the Yosemite Public Beta 4 with no problems other than the DNEP issue.

So, this remains a mystery.

Robin;

Tried you solution, and the SystemConfiguration folder stayed in the directory even though I took it out. However, on reboot, a progress bar did appear during the restart process, which might indicate some activity took place to "rebuild it" based on name change, etc.

Unfortunately, I still have the DNEP issue when my external Hitachi USB 3.0 drive is attached via a Satechi Hub, but no issue when the drive is directly attached.

Would be nice for Apple to at least IDENTIFY the issue, so we can only buy products that will work properly. Ideally of course, they would fix the issue, but that is another story.

RE: New Mac Pro (late 2013) with LaCie externals: 2x3TB, 1x1TB (USB3), and 2x12TB LaCie 2BIG (each RAID 0 on Thunderbolt 2).

The 12TB drives were behaving perfectly when brand new (about 3 weeks old now). Then, Final Cut Pro with a certain MOTIONVFX.com plug-in occasionally caused my system to crash and reboot automatically. 😟 As a result, finder prefs (minimally) got corrupted and I couldn't even dup or delete a file or folder. PLUS, eventually, the 12's would no longer sleep with the computer and then get ejected when the Mac slept for an extended period of time and when the Mac woke up, it produced the dreaded, "DISK NOT EJECTED PROPERLY" message for BOTH 12's.

I tried everything: zapping PRAM, resetting SMC, rebooting, repairing permissions...Nothing worked. LaCie: No help, although they offered to send new Thunderbolt cables.

I had the same drive-not-sleeping problem with my Mac Mini for a while, and that inexplicably went away recently.

Sooooo... Here's how mine got fixed. Hope it works for you...

Last night there was a car accident (somewhere) at 2:45AM and for 2-1/2 hours we had a power outage in the entire area. At 6AM I woke the computer and the drives were once again working perfectly (and not getting improperly ejected).

The one thing I hadn't tried was shutting down the Mac PRO for an extended period (probably the same extended period of simple sleep that caused the ejection). The Mac Mini's drive-sleep problem probably also went away when it was powered down recently for lack of use.

So try it: Power-down for at least 2 hours.

∆

I found this thread while searching for answers and haven't read it all, but here is what I am experiencing:

On MacBook Pro early 2013, Mountain Lion, with USB3 drives FAT32, WD Mybook, Samsung Story3.

I randomly get the message "disk was not ejected correctly" after a wake from sleep.

Happens also sometimes when the disk was ejected prior to putting MacBook to sleep.

Happens so far only with FAT32 drives.

Happens also but less often live, when drives are plugged through a USB3 hub, but in that case with Mac formatted drives too.

Volume will not mount and Disk Utility cannot repair the drive, says "save your files and format the drive".

Reboot will not fix.

Usually the drive will be fit again if left unplugged for a night or so.

Maybe because computer was shut also but I have not checked who's doing what.

Sometimes leaving it plugged will fix it after a while through some sort of self healing routine.

Strange and annoying thing.

I wish I knew what is going on. Will read the numerous pages here when I have time.

Is there a Mac OS utility that would help? Unfortunately DiskWarrior does not support FAT32.

Cheers

Paul

So try it: Power-down for at least 2 hours.

Right! Having an extended coffee break is better than breaking the drive for good. 🙂

That doesn't tell me what happened in the first place, faulty connectors, faulty computer... ?...

I feel compelled to jump in here.

I had this same problem for a long time and did much research and tried many suggested solutions until I came upon the solution that totally worked for me.

I discovered that the problem had nothing to do with the system software. It turns out the the problem resides in the USB cables. I replaced all my USB cables from hard drive to the USB hub and from the hub to my iMac with brand new quality cables. I have not had 1 ejection now for the last 4 months.

I was running Mavericks when I swapped out my cables and just recently upgraded to Yosemite. No hard drive ejections or failing to wake from sleep.

Good luck to everyone.

mikeymark wrote:

I had this same problem for a long time and did much research and tried many suggested solutions until I came upon the solution that totally worked for me.

Is your whole system from hard drives -> cables -> hub -> iMac USB3?

I was having ejecting issues with USB3, so replaced cables/hub with USB2 (and just put up with the slower speeds). I have not had a problem since. Interested if you've been able to retain USB3 with no probs...?

mikeymark wrote:

I discovered that the problem had nothing to do with the system software. It turns out the the problem resides in the USB cables. I replaced all my USB cables from hard drive to the USB hub and from the hub to my iMac with brand new quality cables. I have not had 1 ejection now for the last 4 months.

In some instances, Apple requires cables compliant to a certain standard. For instance, I had to purchase 3 cables for my NEC monitor before I had one that was fully compatible with wake from sleep. I found in the Apple support pages that there is a grounding issue with the ones built to PC standards. Maybe there is such requirement with Apple USB3, and not all cables are Apple compliant? It could be also physical weaknesses in the way they are built like flimsy contacts or too much play.

I'd be interested in being suggested a brand of proven Apple compliant cables.