Q: Disk not ejected properly

10 days after Robin's fix and everything works fine now. No ejections. But my audio not coming back after sleep was continuing. I called Apple and they instructed me to reinstall Mavericks completely. I did and still haven't had either problem again.

This solved my problem. 10 days and not a single eject. Thank you!

Any word on Apple fixing this issue? I have a Seagate Backup Plus Slim 2TB usb3.0 drive that keeps randomly ejecting (even when not putting the computer to sleep). My WD Mybook usb3 hard drive is now ejecting randomly also, which it didn't used to do (until I got the Seagate). Doesn't seem to matter if the drives are plugged into a hub or directly.

Worried about losing important data.

I've alread tried the trashing preferences fix detailed in this thread. Didn't seem to solve the issue.

I'm due for a response from Apple this week and will advise any useful news. However, after watching this thread for about a month, I'm not so sure "this issue" is necessarily just one  issue. Sure, we're all getting the "Disk not ejected properly" message but there seem to be a lot a variables in the (limited) successes people are reporting. For some it's just a different cable or variations of power sources, hubs, adapters etc; for others it's a software/preferences fix. And your description of a "randomly ejecting" HDD sounds a bit different to many of the stories here, which seem to be related to ejection after idle/sleep. Certainly my Seagate HDD only ever gets ejected coming back from display off or hard drive sleep. The rest of the time it's fine. Suggest you give Apple a call. They may be able to help you isolate the issue.

I thought I would chime in here. I am totally new to Macs. I got a refurb iMac OS X Mavericks 9.2 not even a month ago. I have not used migration assistant ~~~~ yet. I will need to move all my info. from my old windows Vista laptop. I also have a Lacie porche 2TB USB 3.0/2.0 desktop drive I'm using for back-up. I also have an APC back-up 750 battery back up/surge protector. The morning after I installed the Lacie, I got the same error ejection message as laid out in the original post here. Everytime my Mac came back from display, or off of hard drive sleep, I got the error message. So I began searching to find out what the problem was. I landed on this thread as it was the only 1 I could find dealing with the problem on Mavericks. What didn't fit was that I had not used migration assistant.

March 31st, I began experimenting to see if I could isolate the problem as someone else had mentioned thier power strip being the cause. The APC battery back-up has an energy saving "master" plug that controls all devices plugged into the "controlled by master" outlets. You can enable the feature where when the device plugged into the master gets turned off or placed in standby mode then it does the same for all devices in "controlled by master plugs"; when the master device is turned on or taken out of standby then everything else is also turned on or taken out of standby. I disabled that feature on it & have tested it every which way since then & have had no error messages since. Well, I did have one yesterday but it was immediately after we had a nano second power blip so that I guess is understandable.

Still doing fine today.

Sandypaws described a UPS theory. Coincidently today I decided to try and improve the long standing DNEP problem I have on my iMac.  I came across this thread with reference to energy saving power strips and had implemented a similar solution that Sandypaws described with his UPS.

My setup is early 2013 iMac with external powered USB3 Toshiba Stor.E 2GB drive used for hourly Time Machine backup and USB3 powered Hitachi used for daily Carbon Copy images. An APC ES 550 UPS is attached. The DNEP has become problematic in last few months but has only affected the external seperate powered dive - not the USB3 bus powered drive. I have tried switching off the energy saving master function on the UPS in a similar way to sandypaws but is too early to tell how effective that is. One aspect that makes me suggest there may be a contribution by the energy saving mode on UPS is that occasionally the iMac would not boot - seemed non powered but rebooting the UPS not the computer fixed the problem. I have also attached an old USB2 powered external hard disk as second time Machine backup to see if USB2 is better than USB3

As others have said there may well be multiple causes and solutions for this DNEP problem but for those with an energy saving UPS or energy saving power strips it may be worth trying disabling these as it is simple to try.

just to chime in here - have never seen this problem on a mac before after using them for 20 years, until i recently got a 7 port powered usb 3 hub, and a usb 3 2m extension cable - in an effort to hide all the things (ext hard drives etc) away in a cabinet.

Started getting these 'drive not ejected properly' messages. tried the fixes described in this thread (jettison app + orig solution) but these did not fix the problem. my drives were ejecting randomly - not just on waking/sleeping.

I assumed it was the hub - but then thought to try the hub without the extension cable - and voila, no more error messages. so in this case it looks like a faulty extension cable that works only half the time. So, not that great.

Anyone particularly fond of a specific brand/type of usb3 extension cable that I might have more success with? the one i got was a no name brand off ebay for $5. (lesson learned)

this is very annoying because the same problem happens with SD cards inside PCI Express Card SD adapter at my 17" Macbook Pro.

the conclusion is this is not related to brand or model of external storage... it could be related to OS X energy saver code or something related.

Actually I'd tend to agree with houstonwehaveaproblem2014 I think there are many different issues going on here. I've discovered that this issue only occurs when my Seagate Backup Plus Slim drive is plugged in. My WD Mybook works fine, even connected through a usb3 hub. But when the Seagate is plugged in, both drives eject erratically. I'll get a replacement from Amazon and let you guys know if the new one works better.

I think it's definitely the OS X energy saver code.  I think I've proven this because running "caffeinate" absolutely solves all the problems for me.  caffeinate is a program you run at the command line in Terminal.  I just keep it running 24/7, so my Mac never sleeps.

As update to my earlier post about trying disabling the Master/Intelligent Power saving on the APC UPS (may also apply to power strips).

It is now 10 days since disabled this feature on the APC Back-UPS 550 and have not had one Time Machine "Failure to eject correctly"  compared to at least daily ones previously. I did at the same time disable the put the hard disk to sleep option in OSX energy saver preferences. I have now re-enabled this option in OSX and will see what happens.

I was able to fix my issues by preventing spotlight from searching external hard drives.

System Preferences -> Privacy -> +External Drives

An update to my post of April 2nd. Since disabling the power saver mode on my APC back-up/power strip on March 31st, I have not had the DNEP problem.

Just tried excluding the Spotlight search feature for one of the drives that keeps ejecting but it didn't solve the problem for me.

And as far as turning off the power saver mode, I don't want to do that. I like having everything go to Sleep when it is not being used. I shouldn't have to do that.

c41 wrote:

 

I assumed it was the hub - but then thought to try the hub without the extension cable - and voila, no more error messages. so in this case it looks like a faulty extension cable that works only half the time. So, not that great.

 

Just to provide further info in my ongoing tests and trying to work out the cause of problems for me...

I'm now not convinced its a faulty extension cable - as If i reorder the chain and test with one of my hd's, (imac -> usb3 hub -> 2m usb 3.0 extension cable -> usb 3.0 hd) (ie: putting the extension cable downstream from the hub) I am not getting the random eject issue (DNEP issue). So perhaps the issue is with my hub and its ability to hold a strong usb 3.0 signal (?) cannot be extended past its own short 20 inch cable.

Long story short, if you're having problems and are also using hubs or extra cables, try taking them out (or isolating parts of the chain) and using your usb devices connected directly to your mac to see if the problem persists.